Always on call? Yeah, we get it. The thing is, all your texting, emailing, and general technological dicking around in the evening might be wrecking your time at work the next day.
In a study published in Organizational Behaviour and Human Decision Processes, researchers found that workers who used their smartphones after 9PM were less engaged on the job the next day. Researchers had eighty-two upper level managers complete multiple surveys over two weeks, and they also surveyed 161 employees across several occupations, from dentists to shift-workers. Perhaps unsurprisingly, both surveys indicated that smartphone usage cut into sleep time (which your brain needs). However, workers who used computers and TVs in the evening didn’t report as many problems as the smartphone users.
Part of the problem may be that smartphones emit a lot of blue light, which previous studies have shown is the most sleep-disrupting of colours. Of course, the explanation might be simpler than that: if you’re using a smartphone, you aren’t sleeping.
Our advice? Turn it off after dinner and invest in a real alarm clock. Unless you’re a doctor, it can probably wait.
