The National Sleep Foundation’s annual survey gave teenagers an ‘F’ grade for practicing healthy sleep behaviors, which is impacting their mental health.
Good sleep hygiene and mental health are inextricably linked, each one influencing the other. Bad sleep typically leads to depressive symptoms, and depression often contributes to bad sleep.
More than a third of teens have reported feeling depressed, and nearly three-quarters of them say that sleeping poorly worsened their mental health. At the same time, the vast majority of teens who slept well reported minimal to no depression symptoms.
John Lopos, CEO of the National Sleep Foundation, said that amid America’s current youth mental health crisis, ‘it’s important to put more evidence behind the strong connection with sleep, especially in our kids.’
