The mismatch between our biological clock and our social clock is called social jetlag. Social jetlag is commonly experienced across the population, as a result of shift work or forced time mismatch. We are faced with the problem of sleep, which is the most obvious symptom of social jetlag. Chronic sleep deprivation is characterized as a "public health epidemic" by the World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as are Type 2 diabetes, heart disease, obesity and depression. In addition to these diseases, sleep deprivation also damages our daily lives, affecting our alertness, hand-eye coordination, memory, logical reasoning and emotional stability.
What Is Social Jetlag?
In our daily lives, we are constantly in an endless rush. We try to fulfill our social obligations, such as work, school. We try to devote time to what we want to take care of, our hobbies, our curiosities, our family and friends in the remaining time. But we only have a short time frame of 24 hours to do that. So how successful are we at handling this intense pace? How compatible can we say that the sun's clock, our body's clock and our social clock are with each other? Could our desire to sleep a little more when the alarm of the clock you set up for work in the morning goes off be due to the mismatch between these clocks?
Before answering these questions, we need to briefly explain the hours mentioned above. The first is the concept of a clock formed by the rotation of the Earth itself and The Sun, which we call the sun's clock. In other words, it is literally the clock of nature that we call the successive cycle of day and night.
Second, we describe the clock we are talking about, our biological clock, the biological rhythm, which is the physical, mental and behavioral changes that a creature repeats at certain intervals, as the innate time tool of the organism that governs it. The biological clock is also known as the circadian clock. Events such as our sleep/wake cycle, body temperature cycle, hormonal secretion cycle without external factors are our biological rhythms controlled by our biological clock. Our biological clock is a body clock influenced by the season and the light-dark cycle.
Finally, the clock that affects our lives is our own invention, our social clock. The Social Hour takes its place in our lives as the time period we must follow to fulfill our social obligations, such as work, school. The alarm that we set by thinking about the time we set to catch up with a place or the traffic and preparation time to catch up with work in the morning is our social hour.
Till Roenneberg, professor of chronobiology at Ludwig-Maximilian University in Munich, calls the mismatch between our biological clock and our social clock the social jetlag as a result of his work. The concept of social jetlag, like the normal state of jetlag, can be explained as the result of the shift between the time zone imposed by social norms and the time zone of our biological clock, which are two time zones of our bodies.
According to Till Roenneberg, two-thirds of the world's population experience social jetlag, even for at least an hour a week. In Modern life, especially those of us in the vast majority living in industrialized cities, we are trying to put aside our biological clock and capture our social clocks. Our social activities, having fun, working, eating, sleeping hours are all determined according to social norms. Before we can meet the sleep time needed by our biological clock, we have to wake up with the alarm that we have "forced" to set. Our bodies are affected by the shift between these hours. At this point we are faced with the problem of sleep, which is the most obvious symptom of social jetlag.
Chronic sleep deprivation is described as a "public health epidemic" by the World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and prevention, including Type 2 diabetes, heart disease, obesity and depression. In addition to these diseases, sleep deprivation also damages our daily lives, affecting our alertness, hand-eye coordination, memory, logical reasoning and emotional stability. Also missing the cycle of natural sunlight, constant exposure to artificial light causes many people to delay their sleep schedule and therefore experience social jetlag.
Another researcher at Monash University in Melbourne and Andrew Phillips, with his research students with irregular bedtimes were less successful academic success of students who have revealed that more consistent sleep patterns. In this study, it was learned that social jetlag not only causes individual diseases, but also plays an important role in an individual's work and school performance.
The list of problems raised by the social jetlag situation unfortunately continues to grow. Inside each of our cells is a molecular clock that governs the timing of almost every physiological process in our body. Biological clocks control our hormone secretion, the activity of our immune cells, our body temperature, even our mood at different times of day and night. For every hour of social jetlag that a person experiences every week, it has again been found to cause an 11% increase in the likelihood of developing cardiovascular disease. Social jetlag is also known to cause worse moods and fatigue. Similarly, alcohol and nicotine consumption are considered behavioral symptoms of an inability to cope with social demands.
Another study, on the other hand, found that adults with higher levels of social jetlag were more likely to be overweight or obese compared to those with more regular sleep patterns.
What Can Be Done About Social Jetlag?
Till Roenneberg notes that for the solution of the concept of social jetlag, society should implement daylight saving time (another source of social jetlag) and flexible working hours by employers to maintain a person's sleep order. He even says in a statement that if he were an employer, he would ban the use of alarm clocks and instruct employees to start work only after they have had enough sleep. "Most employees would be in the office at 10 or 11 a.m., but that would improve productivity, reduce sick days and take your best time as an employer, "he says, adding that this would create a" win-win situation."
Looking at all this, it is not wrong to say that one of the factors that lead to the great problems of the modern era is social jetlag. But unfortunately, despite the social jetlag doing so much damage, it seems impossible to distance ourselves from this situation today. Social jetlag is commonly experienced across the population, as a result of shift work or forced time mismatch. We can't get the sleep we need for our biological clock all week at work or school pace. Again, as a result of this pace, we cannot use the necessary sunlight for our body. As a result, we spend weekends trying to cover these shortcomings. But we can't literally eliminate the mismatch between our biological clock and our social clock.
In particular, despite the rapid progress of technological advances and increased productivity, long-unchanged working conditions of 40 hours per week make our work difficult. Condemning people to the same working hours for years increases the diseases that develop along with social jetlag.In terms of human physical and spiritual well-being of this clock system, changing the natural light-dark balance provided by The Sun in harmony with our biological clock could be an important point in the battle against social jetlag.