Its the sort of buzzwordy phrase that you would expect to hear at a business seminar: social jetlag.
Unlike garden variety jetlag, social jetlag can also wreak long term damage to your health.
Tick tock goes our body clock
Everyone has their own circadian rhythm, or internal body clock.
An alarm clock set at 6 a.m. on December 3, 2007, in Bonn, Germany.© Ute Grabowsky/Photothek via Getty Images
People fall along a spectrum of preferred sleep times, known as chronotypes.
A persons circadian rhythm and chronotype is usually most influenced by the natural day/night cycle along with their genetics.
This mismatch is then thought to cause social jetlag.
They defined it as a discrepancy between our preferred and forced-upon sleep schedules throughout a typical week.
So-called shift workers are significantly more likely to experiencesleep disorders,heart disease, anddiabetes.
But even the more subtle alterations resulting from social jetlag seem to wear people down over time.
Studies have also found a link between social jetlag andtype 2 diabetes,cardiovascular disease, anddepression.
Interestingly enough, social jetlag might paradoxically be a sign of better health in some groups of people.
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