By Victoria Allen Science Correspondent For The Daily Mail
Published: 16:12 GMT, 5 March 2019 | Updated: 16:14 GMT, 5 March 2019
View
comments
If you have a sulky teenager at home, the answer might be to allow them a lie-in.
Teenagers are less likely to feel unhappy and worry if they get just an hour more sleep in the morning.
An extra hour in bed makes adolescents 25 per cent less likely to feel very nervous and tense and about a third less likely to worry about things, a study has found.
It cuts their chances of often feeling unhappy, sad or depressed by eight per cent and reduces the odds of frequently feeling hopeless about the future.
The research, based on more than 2,100 schoolchildren, concludes that teenagers' body clocks are thrown off by having to get up too early in the mornings, which may be bad for emotion regulation in the brain.
Teenagers are less likely to feel unhappy and worry if they get just an hour more sleep in the morning, according to research
The authors, led by Dr Aaron Berger at the University of Minnesota, state: 'Although we know that adolescents require eight to 10 hours of sleep for optimal functioning, very few teens are able to get this much sleep on school nights.
'Improving sleep duration could potentially enhance mental wellbeing. Given that short sleep duration among adolescents is a population-wide issue, a public health approach is needed.'
The NHS recommends that teenagers get nine hours of sleep a night, but teenagers' sleeping
