Can Less Sleep Lead to Bad Grades? Here's What New Study Says

College kids who get less sleep on a daily basis are more likely to get bad grades.

(Photo: iStock/Altered by FIT)

College students who get less sleep on a daily basis are more likely to get bad grades, says a new study.

The Big Point: The study conducted on first-year college students in the United States, titled Nightly Sleep Duration Predicts Grade Point Average in the First Year of College, published in the PNAS journal stated:

“Lower average nightly sleep early in the academic term predicted lower end-of-term GPA. Every hour of lost total average nightly sleep was associated with a 0.07 reduction in end-of-term GPA.”

Night Owls: J David Creswell, Psychology Professor at Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Mellon University and author of this study, told USNews that the first-year college students who participated in the study slept for around 6.5 hours each night, as opposed to the recommended sleep of 7 hours or more for people in their age group.

Sleeping Patterns: The study published on 13 February, added that the students clocked 6 hours and 29 minutes of sleep each night, with the duration going up to 6 hours and 58 minutes during the weekends. Here are some key patterns that the study found:

• Average time to go to sleep: 2:01 am

• Average time to wake up: 9:17 am

“Sensitivity analyses using sleep thresholds also indicated that sleeping less than 6 h each night was a period where sleep shifted from helpful to harmful for end-of-term GPA, relative to previous-term GPA.”

Too Much To Do, Too Little Time: The study authors found that for first-year kids who’ve just entered college, there’s pressure to do everything and more – hang out with friends, go to parties, enroll in clubs, study well, and even intern at places – which is what might to fewer hours of sleep for them.

Try This:

• Maintain a routine where you try and go to sleep around the same time each night

• Avoid coffee around your bedtime

• Don’t use your phone when you’re in bed trying to sleep