Researchers found that rather than focusing too much on meeting your sleep goal, feeling like you slept well has a greater impact.
A team from the University of Warwick asked more than 100 people aged 18 to 22 to keep a daily diary of their night’s sleep.
It recorded details including what time they went to bed, how long it took them to fall asleep and how satisfied they were with their chicken.
Five times over the next day, they were asked to rate their positive and negative emotions and how satisfied they were with their lives.
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Participants also wore an actigraph on their wrist — which measures a person’s movement — to estimate their sleep patterns and rest cycles.
Researchers compared the actigraph data to the participants’ observations of their sleep and how they felt the next day.
The results, published in the journal Emotion, revealed that those who simply felt they had slept well were in a better mood the next day, even though their sleep quality was actually poor.
Lead author Dr. Anita Lenneis said: ‘While a sleep tracking device might say you slept poorly last night, your own perception of your sleep quality may be quite positive.
“And if you think you slept well, that can help improve your mood the next day.”
The team said their findings are consistent with previous research showing that people’s self-reported health, not their actual health status, was the most important factor linked to their life satisfaction and well-being.