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Pink noise reduces REM sleep and may harm sleep quality

pennmedicine.org

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Re: Pink noise reduces REM sleep and may harm sleep quality

#41

Post by stogot »

el_benhameen wrote: post #36
throwforfeds wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing that stood out more to me than the n being low is "the participants reported not previously using noise to help them sleep or having any sleep disorders." Sleeping with pink noise seems like something that you'd end up getting acclimated to. My n=1 is that I often sleep with a fan on and live in NYC -- whenever I stay in a place where there is no noise I tend to have trouble sleeping, so I end up turning on…

Yeah that seems silly. I was a quiet-room sleeper until I met my wife, who needs some kind of white noise to sleep. I eventually adapted and now sleep much better with noise than without (at least subjectively), but that change took a while, at least several months. I found it quite difficult to sleep with for a while.

I slept without noise for years until I needed it for a while for (reason) and now it feels difficult to sleep without noise. Acclimation’s a real effect

Re: Pink noise reduces REM sleep and may harm sleep quality

#42

Post by thenthenthen »

is_true wrote: post #16
thenthenthen wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. In summer I get ‘addicted’ to fan noise and cant sleep without. I moved to Asia and the AC is such a blessing.

I'm also addicted to the fan but not only for the noise I like feeling the wind in my face, I think that as it also helps lower your body temperature you sleep better

Wind in my face literally makes me catch a cold within the night, feet/legs is where it is at for me haha

Re: Pink noise reduces REM sleep and may harm sleep quality

#43

Post by fy20 »

nine_k wrote: post #28
mezzman wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reminds me of an old Wired interview with Danny Hillis when he developed a system called Babble that used unintelligible vocal bits as background sound to help concentration, too bad it never really went anywhere. https://www.wired.com/2005/06/applied-minds-think-remarkably...

For me that would be the worst kind of distraction: always triggered by sounds of communication, never able to recognize what is said. I suspect not all such statistical results apply uniformly to all people.

Yes I have the opposite. I can focus better when I'm working from a coffee shop and I don't understand what people are saying.

Re: Pink noise reduces REM sleep and may harm sleep quality

#44

Post by zeta0134 »

anigbrowl wrote: post #13

Researchers observed 25 healthy adults, ages 21 to 41, in a sleep laboratory during eight-hour sleep opportunities over seven consecutive nights. Absurdly low n . Additionally, I've become very skeptical of anything coming out of sleep labs after my wife was sent to one (at a prestigious teaching hospital) by her doctor some years ago: the 'sleep opportunity' was lights out at 9pm for 8 hours, and the staff were whol…

My options are "fairly loud, low rumbly, mostly full spectrum noise" or "continual, nonstop barking." Only one of these options makes sleep possible. :) I'd prefer quiet, but it's so rare to actually have it.

Re: Pink noise reduces REM sleep and may harm sleep quality

#45

Post by fn-mote »

A lot of comments here dismiss the study for having a small N.

Exploratory research uses small N at the start. This kind of research can have value even if it is not conclusive.

Imagine the expense (and dominance of Big Research) if every study needed 100,000 participants to run.

If you don’t want to read exploratory studies, ignore them when they hit the headline news.

Other criticisms of this study (e.g., participants didn’t previously sleep with noise) seem more on the mark. I’m not an uncritical fan.

Re: Pink noise reduces REM sleep and may harm sleep quality

#46

Post by thenobsta »

trial3 wrote: post #9

study aside, pink noise is awful imo - it's perfect if you're calibrating a PA system and need specific power spectral density properties, but bad for my brain. if sleeping somewhere without a fan or whatever i use brown noise, it's closer to a lower rumbling.

I really like brown noise at night.

My immediate thought about this article was that I'd love to see this study on brown noise (albeit, with more participants).

Second thought was that, I wonder if some A/B testing with my garmin watch would give signal on this. Life is probably too hectic to get real signal.

Re: Pink noise reduces REM sleep and may harm sleep quality

#47

Post by eastbound »

diogenescynic wrote: post #39

I feel unsafe wearing earplugs. You're so totally unaware. I'm worried I'd sleep through an alarm.

Since I own a house, I’m afraid of burglars (or rapt) and any crack seems like a sign the roof might fall… so yes, no earplugs…

Re: Pink noise reduces REM sleep and may harm sleep quality

#48

Post by braiamp »

I would recommend reading the paper rather than the article, or at least the abstract:

> Compared to a noise-free control night, EN reduced N3 deep sleep (p < .0001) while PN reduced REM sleep (p < .001). Adding PN to EN worsened sleep structure, despite minor dose-dependent improvements of EN-induced sleep fragmentation and N3 sleep increases. Earplugs mitigated nearly all EN effects on sleep but started failing at the highest EN level (65 dBA). Morning cognition, cardiovascular measures, and hearing were not affected by nighttime noise, but subjective assessments of sleep, alertness and mood were significantly worse after EN and PN exposure.

Re: Pink noise reduces REM sleep and may harm sleep quality

#49

Post by enraged_camel »

fn-mote wrote: post #45

A lot of comments here dismiss the study for having a small N. Exploratory research uses small N at the start. This kind of research can have value even if it is not conclusive. Imagine the expense (and dominance of Big Research) if every study needed 100,000 participants to run. If you don’t want to read exploratory studies, ignore them when they hit the headline news. Other criticisms of this study (e.g., participa…

Bashing studies for having now N is common because it’s the easiest thing for non-scientists to criticize when they don’t like a study’s findings.

Scientists, on the other hand, know that low N does not necessarily reduce the validity or the value of a study.

Re: Pink noise reduces REM sleep and may harm sleep quality

#50

Post by lukeinator42 »

anigbrowl wrote: post #13

Researchers observed 25 healthy adults, ages 21 to 41, in a sleep laboratory during eight-hour sleep opportunities over seven consecutive nights. Absurdly low n . Additionally, I've become very skeptical of anything coming out of sleep labs after my wife was sent to one (at a prestigious teaching hospital) by her doctor some years ago: the 'sleep opportunity' was lights out at 9pm for 8 hours, and the staff were whol…

It's a within-subject design and they literally did a power analysis in the paper. This is not absurdly low n.
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