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Melissa Fleur Afshar is a Newsweek reporter primarily based in London, United Kingdom.

Her present focus is on trending life tales and human-interest options on quite a lot of matters starting from relationships, pets, and private funds to well being, work, journey, and household dynamics. She has lined present affairs, social points, and life-style tales extensively.

Melissa joined Newsweek in 2023 from International’s LBC and had beforehand labored at monetary information publication WatersTechnology, tmrw Journal, The Instances and The Sunday Instances, Higher London-based radio broadcaster Madness Radio, and alongside different journalists or producers for analysis functions. Since becoming a member of Newsweek, Melissa has been particularly targeted on overlaying under-reported ladies’s well being and social points, and has spent a big a part of her time researching the bodily and psychological affect of each the contraceptive tablet and abusive relationships.

Previous to that, Melissa had been specialised in reporting on monetary know-how and knowledge information, political information, and present affairs. She has lined knowledge administration information from business giants like Bloomberg and Symphony, alongside the loss of life of Queen Elizabeth II, the U.Ok economic system’s 2022-pound sterling crash, a number of Nationwide Well being Service (NHS) strikes, and the Mahsa Amini protests in Iran.

A present that she produced and introduced on the Higher London-based group radio station, Madness Radio, was awarded ‘Greatest Topical Information Present’ and the runner up award for ‘Greatest New Radio Present’ on the community.

She is a graduate in MA Historical past from Royal Holloway, College of London.

Languages: English, Persian.

You will get in contact with Melissa by emailing m.afshar@newsweek.com.

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Melissa Fleur Afshar

Life and Traits Reporter

Sleep specialists have lengthy warned of the hazards of bringing smartphones into the bed room. Now, analysis has confirmed simply how damaging that behavior could be.

The brand new examine, which surveyed greater than 45,000 college college students in Norway, discovered that late-night display was related to a big discount in sleep high quality and length.

Furthermore, spending only one hour on a display after going to mattress was linked to a 59 p.c improve within the danger of insomnia.

Regardless of its status as an enormous dangerous of recent know-how, scrolling by social media was not discovered to be extra disruptive than different screen-based actions.

“The kind of display exercise doesn’t seem to matter as a lot as the general time spent utilizing screens in mattress,” paper writer Gunnhild Johnsen Hjetland of the Norwegian Institute of Public Well being stated in an announcement.

“We discovered no important variations between social media and different display actions, suggesting that display use itself is the important thing think about sleep disruption—doubtless because of time displacement, the place display use delays sleep by taking over time that may in any other case be spent resting.”

The findings spotlight a rising disconnect between know-how use and sleep hygiene amongst younger adults. Whereas it’s broadly understood that sleep is vital to psychological and bodily well being, fashionable bedtime routines more and more embody screens, apps and notifications—all of which can hold the mind on excessive alert lengthy after lights out.

“Sleep issues are extremely prevalent amongst college students and have important implications for psychological well being, tutorial efficiency, and total well-being,” Hjetland stated. “Given the widespread use of screens in mattress, we aimed to discover the connection between totally different display actions and sleep patterns.

“We anticipated that social media use is perhaps extra strongly related to poorer sleep, given its interactive nature and potential for emotional stimulation.”

Different sleep specialists may agree; the truth is, Chelsie Rohrscheib, a neuroscientist and sleep specialist who serves as head of sleep at Wesper, advised Newsweek that doomscrolling—the compulsive consumption of unfavourable information on-line—can set off an intense physiological chain response within the mind.

Of their examine, researchers drew on knowledge from the 2022 College students’ Well being and Wellbeing survey, a nationally consultant well being examine of full-time greater schooling college students in Norway aged 18 to twenty-eight.

Individuals had been requested about their bedtime display habits, together with how lengthy they used screens after going to mattress and which actions they selected—from watching films to looking, finding out or listening to audio content material.

Researchers then measured these responses in opposition to self-reported sleep metrics, together with their common bedtime and get up time, their issue falling or staying asleep, daytime drowsiness and whether or not these signs had continued for 3 months or extra.

The outcomes had been unambiguous: extra display time correlated with much less sleep, however social media was not the perpetrator alone.

A further hour of post-bedtime display was related to an elevated within the danger of insomnia signs of 59 p.c and a shortened sleep length of a mean of 24 minutes. Opposite to their expectations, researchers discovered no statistical distinction between social media and different screen-based actions.

The findings level to “time displacement,” somewhat than emotional stimulation or content material sort, as being the principle cause why an additional hour on-line could be dangerous to sleep.

“If display use displaces time that would in any other case be used for sleep, this will likely clarify the discount in sleep length,” stated Hjetland.

How To Unwind at Night time

Hjetland added that whereas the examine design couldn’t decide causality, the outcomes nonetheless assist a transparent takeaway: if you’re not sleeping nicely, it is perhaps time to rethink taking screens to mattress with you.

“Should you battle with sleep and suspect that display time could also be an element, attempt to scale back display use in mattress, ideally stopping at the very least 30–60 minutes earlier than sleep,” Hjetland stated. “Should you do use screens, contemplate disabling notifications to attenuate disruptions throughout the night time.”

Speaking about doomscrolling particularly, Rohrscheib added that the observe “raises your stress ranges, which can result in activation of your amygdala, the world of your mind answerable for the stress response. This in flip prompts your sympathetic nervous system, which locations you in a state of battle or flight.”

That stress response releases cortisol and adrenaline, each of that are “extraordinarily stimulating. This makes it very troublesome to go to sleep and keep asleep.”

Along with the biochemical response, the act of consuming distressing content material—particularly on the finish of the day—may cause hyperfocus and nervousness, trapping the mind in a suggestions loop that blocks pure relaxation.

“Consuming demanding info causes hyperfixation and a racing thoughts, which makes it practically unimaginable on your mind waves to decelerate and provoke the sleep course of,” Rohrscheib stated.

To attenuate hurt, Rohrscheib recommends adopting a nightly wind-down ritual, ideally starting one to 2 hours earlier than mattress.

“Ideally, it’s best to contemplate a pre-bedtime routine that focuses on decreasing stress and enjoyable,” she stated. “This consists of placing away your digital units.”

As display use continues to surge throughout generations and units, the brand new findings might supply a easy, science-backed step towards higher sleep: flip off the cellphone, flip down the lights and let your mind and physique relaxation.

Newsweek reached out to Hjetland for additional remark through electronic mail.

Is there a well being problem that is worrying you? Tell us through well being@newsweek.com. We are able to ask specialists for recommendation, and your story could possibly be featured on Newsweek.

Reference

Hjetland, G, J., & Sivertsen, B. (2025). How and when screens are used: Evaluating totally different display actions and sleep in Norwegian college college students. Frontiers in Psychiatry. http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2025.1548273.