If you are a somewhat seasoned parent, I am sure you have made this mistake too: Keeping your child up a tiny bit later than usual in an attempt to get them to sleep a little bit longer the following morning.
I am also sure – it certainly was the case for me – that it backfired spectacularly.
Kids are sneaky like that.
And it turns out, scientists have now proven this very thing.
Researchers from Penn State University investigated the association between the time a baby goes to bed and the overall amount of overnight sleep, and found that putting babies to bed earlier, rather than later, was the best way to get them to sleep longer throughout the night and give parents more rest.
According to the study, which was published in the journal
Sleep Medicine, the sleep-routines of babies were monitored and they found putting them to bed later was counterproductive and had no real impact on the time they woke up. In fact, for every hour later a baby was put to bed they'd wake up just eight minutes later the next morning – but this was negated by more wakeful periods overnight.
To conduct their studies, the scientists examined the sleep routines of 24 infants over three separate week-long periods at six weeks, 15 weeks and 24 weeks old.
And what they found was rather significant: Putting babies to bed earlier made them sleep longer throughout the night with fewer waking periods and in some cases a later wake-up time the next day. The study found that, for every one hour earlier than their usual bedtime that infants were put to sleep, they slept 34.4 minutes longer that night.
In turn, this has massive health benefits for babies, the researchers found, adding to the findings of several other studies, which have shown the importance of a healthy sleep pattern for young children, particularly in the first year of their life.
"Shorter sleep duration during infancy is associated with adverse health outcomes, including greater adiposity, poorer emotion regulation, impaired growth, and later-life obesity,' the researchers said.
The benefits of a consistent bedtime routine
The US researchers claimed that parental behaviour in managing sleep patterns play a significant part, and that certain aspects of healthy sleep hygiene routines have been shown to improve overall nighttime sleep in young children, including strict routines and low-stimulus activities before lights go out.
"Implementing a consistent bedtime routine has been associated with numerous health outcomes that are well-described," the authors wrote.
Adding that this includes "longer nighttime sleep duration, shorter sleep onset latency, reduced nighttime wakings, and greater sleep consolidation at night."
The recommendation is that infants should be put to bed at an age-appropriate hour to promote longer nighttime sleep – usually between 7pm and 8pm.
