Michiganders will be ‘Falling Back’ tonight as we turn back our clocks one hour. Daylight Saving Time not only disrupts people’s work and play schedules. It also disrupts many people’s sleep schedule.
Anita Shelgikar is a clinical instructor in the University of Michigan Department of Neurology. She works in the U of M sleep lab. She says people may try to take advantage of the end of Daylight Saving Time to get extra sleep, but it doesn’t turn out that way.
“There is a tendency for people to say ‘Well, I’m going to gain an extra hour so I might as well stay up later.’ " says Shelgikar, "And then they are more tired the next day, because they inherently don’t get as much sleep and they throw their schedule off.”
Shelgikar says the end of Daylight Saving Time should help Michiganders sleep better, with light earlier in the morning hours and darkness earlier in the evening hours. That is until we ‘Spring Forward’ early in 2012.
