Latest / In Focus with Carolyn Hutcheson / Sleep Hygiene in the Age of Smartphones - TPR's In Focus - May 13, 2026

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Sleep Hygiene in the Age of Smartphones - TPR's In Focus - May 13, 2026 · In Focus with Carolyn Hutcheson

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  Support comes from the Janice Hawkins Cultural Arts Park
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  on the main campus of Troy University,
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  featuring the International Arts Center,
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  the Fred Nall Hollis Museum,
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  and the Hua Bao Zhu Gallery.
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  More information at troy.edu slash arts park.
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  From Troy Public Radio, this is In Focus,
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  and I'm Carolyn Hutcheson.
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  With today's round-the-clock news cycle
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  and preoccupation with cell phones and screens,
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  sleep may be hard to come by.
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  For 30 years, Dr. Justin Thomas has been involved
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  with health psychology and behavioral sleep medicine.
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  He is director of the UAB Behavioral Sleep Medicine Clinic,
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  and he joins us from Birmingham.
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  Dr. Thomas, welcome to the program.
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  My pleasure, thank you for having me.
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  Dr. Thomas, how did you get interested
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  in the field of sleep disorders?
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  It's kind of a funny story.
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  I was hired as a sleep technologist
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  to run sleep studies at UAB at night
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  to pay for undergraduate education.
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  So it started out just as a job to get me through school,
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  and I kind of fell in love with sleep medicine,
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  and the rest is history.
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  You know, we have people who are using cell phones
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  and social media constantly.
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  I look at them and think they're getting text neck.
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  Does this have an effect on sleep?
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  It definitely does.
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  I mean, there's two aspects of using any type of smartphone
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  and social media in the evenings.
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  The first that I like to emphasize in clinic
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  is light exposure.
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  Light impacts our circadian rhythms,
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  and light tells us that it's time to be awake.
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  And so if the sun has set and it's close to bedtime
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  and we get on any light-emitting device,
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  we're basically telling our brain to wake up
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  and stay awake for a while.
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  Are we talking more about adults or teenagers
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  or kids even younger?
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  I really started mostly in the adult sleep medicine world,
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  but Children's Hospital of Alabama
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  needed somebody to provide behavioral sleep medicine
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  services, so I opened up a pediatric clinic.
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  And so we now see all ages from,
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  we kind of jokingly say, from birth to death.
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  What are the concerns you have when these patients
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  come to you and they're suffering?
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  We do ask about electronic device usage,
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  you know, social media consumption.
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  Kids are more sensitive to light than adults at times.
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  There's some really interesting studies
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  that have been looking at that specifically.
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  And so we're in the kids' side of the clinic.
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  We really try to assess how much people
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  are on light-emitting devices
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  and how that's impacting their ability to fall asleep
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  and stay asleep.
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  And on the adult side as well,
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  and I think once people start to develop insomnia symptoms,
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  they kind of take a life of their own on
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  and it gets to be very difficult to treat.
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  So if they're not sleeping,
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  what about the next day's effectiveness?
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  What we find for people with insomnia
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  is that what they report most is difficulties thinking,
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  concentrating, focusing, maybe some irritability, fatigue.
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  So how do you retrain them with their sleeping patterns?
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  I think the first step, focus on sleep hygiene.
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  It's like not drinking caffeine afternoon,
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  avoiding screens in a couple hours before bedtime.
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  Then we move into what we call
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  cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia,
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  or CBTI for short.
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  That is mostly behavioral approaches
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  so that people don't have to rely on medications.
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  In CBTI, we will often teach relaxation strategies.
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  It's really helpful in addressing stress during the day,
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  but at night, it promotes a sense of calm and relaxation,
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  but it also gives your brain something to do
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  as you're waiting to fall asleep.
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  So you're not thinking about what you have to do
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  the next day or stressful things in your life.
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  The main ingredients to CBTI,
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  we always tell people,
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  if you have trouble falling asleep or staying asleep,
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  don't lay in bed tossing and turning.
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  Get out of bed and do a relaxing activity in dim light
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  and get back into bed when you feel sleepy.
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  Does it work to try to catch up on sleep on the weekend?
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  It can to an extent.
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  If somebody is very sleep deprived during the week,
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  it's far better to try to catch up
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  a little bit on the weekends,
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  but people have to realize
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  that if you're sleep deprived during the week,
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  you can't completely catch up.
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  So that constant sleep deprivation
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  does do some long-term harm.
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  You know, we started out talking about electronic devices.
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  Are you seeing more problems on the increase?
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  I think within the last five to 10 years,
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  the biggest issue we see
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  is people just being on screens too late at night,
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  waking up in the middle of the night
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  and getting back on a screen or checking their phone.
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  And that impacts the circadian system,
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  as I mentioned earlier.
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  Probably one of the more problematic behaviors we see now.
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  And if you see children literally getting addicted
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  to these screens, whether it's gaming or whatever,
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  staying in touch with their friends,
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  what do you advise parents to do?
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  We really find that can be a challenge in teenagers.
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  In younger kids, it's easier to say,
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  you know, put the devices up,
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  make sure they don't have access to them.
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  Teenagers, they can hop out of bed and go grab a device.
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  And so then, you know,
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  we try to work with the teen and the adult,
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  make everybody on the same page.
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  But at the end of the day, regardless of the age,
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  we just really emphasize the harm that can come
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  from being on devices in the evenings.
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  When you mentioned the light emitting from these devices,
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  isn't there such a thing as a screensaver
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  that is a blue light block?
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  Does that really help?
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  They do.
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  There's been a couple of studies
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  that actually looked at the filters
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  that the devices themselves have.
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  And they do help a little bit.
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  Reduce the amount of blue wavelength light
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  or wavelengths around the blue spectrum,
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  because that's really what impacts
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  your circadian system the most.
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  Red wavelengths affects your circadian system the least.
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  They also make screens that you can put on your devices.
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  So in theory, if you really needed to be on a device,
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  you could turn your device's blue light blocking filter
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  or night mode on, and you could use a screen.
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  They make blue light blocking glasses,
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  and you could use all three.
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  And then the amount of blue wavelength light
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  would be dramatically reduced.
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  What do you think about radios or devices
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  that play different sounds like the sea
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  or babbling brooks to sort of calm the mind?
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  They do.
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  I think that the thing that people need to be mindful of
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  as far as sounds in the evening is what you want
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  is something that's what we call white noise.
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  It's kind of constant.
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  You know, you'll hear about people
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  that will fall asleep with their TV on.
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  The downside to that is, you know,
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  if you've ever watched TV, the TV show is one volume,
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  and the commercials are way louder.
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  And your brain pays attention to these changes in volume.
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  So that can be harmful, but a fan
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  or some sort of constant noise can actually be relaxing
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  and drown out any ambient noise that could disrupt sleep.
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  What is the effect of air temperature and body temperature
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  on the ability to go to sleep and stay asleep?
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  Most evidence suggests that people sleep
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  a little bit better with a cooler.
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  Weighted blankets have become a thing to help with sleep.
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  You just wouldn't want the weighted blanket
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  to be too, too warm.
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  The warmer we get, the harder it is to sleep.
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  Your temperature actually declines while you sleep
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  and reaches its lowest point a couple of hours
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  before your natural wake up time.
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  What else do you recommend for a good night's sleep?
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  I would say two things.
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  What we see a lot of people is putting too much faith
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  in consumer wearables, whether they're a watch or a ring
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  that tells them about their sleep.
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  There's this term called orthosomnia.
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  And orthosomnia is where these types of devices
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  can actually make your sleep worse
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  because you start obsessing over your sleep.
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  So I discourage people from worrying about
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  these sleep scores and sleep metrics.
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  There are some resources online.
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  There's an app called CBTI Coach,
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  Cognitive Behavioral Therapy,
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  to prevent some of the issues.
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  But if somebody does find themselves with sleep issues,
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  speak to a physician and feel free to check out
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  like a CBTI Coach app so that they can try to do something
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  to help themselves before they have to go in
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  and see someone like me.
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  How do you weigh in on sleep meds?
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  I think there's a place for them.
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  The American College of Physicians put out a statement
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  several years ago that CBTI should be the first approach.
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  And if that doesn't work, then we should consider meds.
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  But most people get meds first.
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  There is a place for it with acute insomnia.
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  The problem with medications, I think,
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  is that people very quickly and easily become dependent.
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  And then they're kind of stuck on meds forever.
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  And that's something that I don't like to see.
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  Dr. Thomas, I want to thank you for your time today
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  and your insights.
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  I have an idea that many of your listeners
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  will want to check out your recommendations.
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  Awesome. Well, thank you for having me.
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  I love talking about sleep.
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  That was Dr. Justin Thomas,
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  Associate Professor in the Department of Psychiatry
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  and Behavioral Neurobiology
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  at UAB-Hirsing School of Medicine.
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  He is Director of the UAB Behavioral Sleep Medicine Clinic
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  in the UAB Sleep-Wake Disorders Center.
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  Thanks for joining us for In Focus,
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  which is a podcast wherever you get your podcasts.
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  I'm Carolyn Hutcheson,
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  and this is listener-supported Troy Public Radio.