United States doctors have issued a warning that reading e-books before going to sleep can damage a person's sleeping habit as well as their overall health.
A group of medical doctors and scientist from Harvard Medical School compared the effects of reading a regular paper book and the light emitting e-readers before going to sleep. What they found out is that, e-book readers have ends up with inferior sleeping quality and wake up more tired that next morning compared to those who read paper books. The original Kindle however is an exception since it does not emit back lights, experts say.
Study's shows that light-exposure in the evening especially before going to sleep can induce insomnia and other sleep related hazards. The increasing concern about sleeping disorder induced by reading e-books is brought about by the rise in technological advances regarding how people read nowadays.
According to experts, the human body is built to keep to strictly synchronizing with the rhythm of night and day; this is what experts call the "body clock". However, the blue light wavelength, which is common in smartphone, tablets and other LED devices, can interrupt a person's body clock. Study also shows that production of the sleeping hormone melatonin is also disrupted by evening's blue light.
The study took twelve volunteers and locks them inside a sleep laboratory for 14 days. During the first five days, the volunteers read books in paperback form and spent another five days reading e-books from an iPad. After examining the volunteer's blood samples, it reveals that the volunteers took longer time to sleep when reading from an iPad, they also had experienced uncomfortable sleeping pattern and goes up more tired the following morning. The study also tested the Nook and Kindle Fire on the same subjects and has produced similar results.
Dr. Victoria Revell of the University of Surrey, one of the head researchers of the impact of light to a human's body told BBC that "This is a very good study and I think it's really interesting."
