Designated Study He et al 2020

aim

to assess the effect of restricting mobile phone use before bedtime on sleep, pre-sleep arousal, mood and working memory

method

38 undergraduate participants who had a) poor sleep quality and b) habit of mobile phone use at bedtime were conveniently sampled and randomly allocated to intervention (mobile phone restriction 30 mins before bed) or control (no restriction)

particpants in control group received no instructions about phone use

participants were tested one before intervention and again after 4 weeks on the following measures:

• sleep habit measures via sleep diary

• sleep quality measured using PSQI 19- item questionnaire

• pre sleep arousal measured using pre sleep arousal scale (PSAS)

• mood assessed via positive and negative affective scale

• working memory was assessed using N-back task

key findings

sleep quality- intervention was associated with decreases sleep latency, duration and quality

working memory- intervention was also associated with improvements in working memory scores and faster working memory reaction times

pre sleep arousal decreases in the intervention group

positive mood increased, negative mood decreased

improved sleep quality - measures by lower PSQI scores

contributions to psych

electronic device and mobile phone use before bed decreases sleep quality and increases pre sleep arousal. It may also lead to decreases in working memory

Restricting phone use before bed also increase positive affect and decreased negative affect

criticisms and limitations

sleep diary and PSQI are subjective (qualitative and quantitative) increasing rick of participant bias

success of restricting phone use depends on participant willingness and therefore results may not be readily generalizable to the population of adult phone users