Binge-watching may lead to poor sleep quality

People who binge-watched said they experienced more fatigue, insomnia, increased level of alertness before sleep

A new research by the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine links binge-watching to poor sleep quality, more fatigue and increased insomnia. If you stay up until the wee hours of the day watching Game of Thrones, then you can probably to relate to these findings.

By allowing you to stream episodes one after another, on-demand TV aims to involve us in the storyline by heightening suspense and encouraging emotional investment in plot lines and characters. This can result in an excited and aroused state of mind, which may lead to cognitive alertness and difficulty in falling asleep.



Four hundred and twenty three adults, aged 18 to 25, participated in the research through online surveys about how frequently they ‘binge-watched’ shows. Binge-watching was defined as watching multiple successive episodes of the same show in a single sitting, on any kind of screen. The respondents also answered questions about sleep quality and how tired or active they felt throughout the day.

More than 80% of the participants considered themselves binge-watchers, while 20% binge-watching at least a few times a week in the previous month. Slightly more than half of the respondents said that they watched three to four episodes in one sitting, with one session lasting for a little more than three hours. Participants who binge-watched said they experienced more fatigue, more symptoms of insomnia, and a higher level of alertness before falling asleep. They were 98% percent more likely to have poor sleep quality as compared to non-bingers.

However, no relationship could be established between sleep problems and regular television watching, where viewers usually switch from one channel to another.

Co-author Jan Van den Bulck, professor of communication studies at the University of Michigan, says that his research does not substantiate the assumption that binge-watching directly affects sleep quality, but it does prove that the two are linked. There are various ways in which streaming shows can prevent sound sleep, he added.

Firstly, exposure to blue light before bed is not favourable for a stable sleep pattern. Although Van den Bulck explained that television viewing in general is not one of the major factors behind disturbed sleep according to our studies.

“Whether regular television viewing has much effect on sleep is debated,” the authors wrote in their study. Binge-watching in particular was found to be detrimental for sleep.

“When you watch a show on regular TV and it’s over, you have to wait until next week to see the next episode,” Van den Bulck says. “Just like when you go to the gym, you stop working out when your body has had enough; the dumbbells aren’t egging you on to do more.”

Streaming services encourage viewers to continuously watch episodes, at times giving us only a few seconds to decide whether to continue watching.

“The episode ends, a character may or may not have died, and we’re hooked,” he says.

This has an effect similar to that of social media, where we often go to check on one post, but end up wasting an hour. Moreover, Van den Bulck explains how falling asleep after watching something we were heavily invested in may take us a longer time to wind down.

“It’s a different kind of immersion—the idea that you almost feel as if you’re in that world of science fiction or fantasy or action,” he says. “And it’s more intense if you have more hours of exposure.”

He said that evaluation of one’s binge-watching habits may be a good way to improve the amount or quality of sleep. He suggests limiting the time spent watching streaming television, or employing relaxation or mindfulness technique before going to sleep.

He said that although binge-watching is a negative-sounding name, it is not a bad habit.



“I have students who say they’ve been studying hard for their exams, and as a reward they’re going to catch up on their favourite show,” he says. “That’s very rational behaviour and there’s nothing wrong with that.”

Similarly, if you are not struggling to fall asleep or stay active during daytime, your television viewing habits probably do not need to be changed. However, other health hazards posed by binge-watching do need to be taken into account.

This study was conducted on young adults, but Van den Bulck believes that people from other age groups can also have similar problems with binge-watching and sleep, although he guesses that few older adults binge-watch as much as teenagers or people in their 20s.

Van den Bulck said that although his research was not ground-breaking, it was important to evaluate the impact of different kinds of media.

“I often joke that my research on media is always historical,” he says, “because by the time I finish and get it published, something has changed and we have to start all over.”

This story originally appeared on Health.com.