The Mind After Midnight concept may apply to you if you've ever remained up
late leaving angry comments on Twitter postings, eaten a whole pint of ice
cream right out of the carton, drinking another bottle of wine, or just
feeling unhappy.
According to the hypothesis, which was recently described in a paper
published in Frontiers in Network Psychology, when people are awake during
the biological circadian night—generally after midnight—neurophysiological
changes occur in the brain that change how they interact with the outside
world, particularly when it comes to actions like reward processing, impulse
control, and information processing.
These alterations can increase your propensity for negative worldviews,
hazardous actions, and rash decisions (especially those involving compulsive
behaviors like gambling and substance addiction) without fully considering
the repercussions.
Your internal biological circadian clock is tuned towards processes that
promote sleep, not wakefulness, after midnight, according to the paper's
senior author, Elizabeth B. Klerman, MD, PhD, a researcher in the department
of neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital, and a professor of neurology
at Harvard Medical School.
In order to better understand how these circadian disparities impact
behavior, decision-making, and work performance at night—and discover
techniques that might help individuals cope—Klerman views the theory as a
call for researchers to conduct additional studies.
Pilots, medical professionals, police officers, and members of the armed
forces are just a few of the occupations that may be impacted by the
results. New approaches to reducing violent crime, substance abuse problems,
suicides, and other harmful behaviors may result from research as
well.
Numerous studies have shown that people who are up in the middle of the
night have brains that are not operating as effectively as they do while
they are asleep, according to Klerman. "I beg for further study to look at
it since it affects both their health and safety and the safety of
others,"
Dark Hours Are Bad Hours
Previous studies have demonstrated that people are more likely to engage in
dangerous conduct, such as substance abuse, violent crime, and suicide, at
night.
For instance, Michael L. Perlis, PhD, an associate professor of psychology
at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and a
co-author of the Mind After Midnight hypothesis, discovered that suicides
are statistically more likely to occur at night when you account for the
number of people awake at any given time.
The danger of using drugs like cannabis, alcohol, or opioids in an illegal
or inappropriate way increases at night, as do homicides and other violent
crimes.
As we gravitate toward more carbs, fats, and processed meals at night and
frequently consume more calories than we require, our evening food choices
also tend to be harmful.
Why then do all these negative habits manifest themselves at night?
There are a few apparent explanations: for one, it's much simpler to commit
a crime when it's dark out, and there are less people around and awake at
night to assist us control our conduct. However, there may also be a
biological reason.
According to Klerman, the circadian effect on the neuronal activity in our
brains fluctuates during the course of a 24-hour period, resulting in
variations in how we interpret and react to the outside environment.
For instance, positive affect, which refers to the propensity to perceive
information favorably, peaks in the morning when circadian effects are set
to alertness and peaks in the evening when circadian influences are tuned to
sleep.
Parallel to this, negative affect—the propensity to interpret information
negatively or as threatening—is at its peak at night.
Additionally, your body naturally creates more dopamine at night, which
might change your reward and motivation processes and raise your propensity
for risky conduct.
The decision-making regions of the brain, which typically work to reduce
unpleasant emotional distractions and focus on goal-oriented behavior, are
then given this biased interpretation of the information.
However, circadian-influenced modifications that might affect
decision-making, functioning, and prioritizing are also present in these
regions of the brain.
Your perspective on the world narrows and darkens all of a sudden, you
start making bad choices, and your mental map of the environment may no
longer be accurate.
The outcome? You could overindulge, fail to diagnose a patient properly,
wreck an oil tanker into some rocks, or do something worse.
Klerman initially felt some of these emotions when she battled to sleep due
to severe jet lag while traveling to Japan.
While she was lying there and watched the clock go tick click tick, "I was
beyond myself," she recounts, "even though a portion of my brain understood
that ultimately I would fall asleep."
"I then pondered the possibility of drug addiction. If I could, I would be
out now looking for narcotics. Later, I understood that this may also apply
in cases where there are suicidal inclinations, drug misuse, other impulsive
disorders, gambling, or other addictive behaviors. How can I demonstrate
that?
Analyzing the Data to Test the Hypothesis
Here, it's important to have evidence. It's vital to remember that Mind
After Midnight is still only a theory, one that has to be supported by well
planned research investigations.
Ironically, the best way to collect this data without the confounding
effects of sleep loss will require researchers and study staff to be awake
and working well into the wee hours of the morning, for example, by taking
fMRI images of study participants whose sleep cycles have been carefully
adjusted for nighttime wakefulness or by implementing other protocols.
"The majority of scientists don't like getting paged in the middle of the
night. The majority of research assistants and technicians don't want to
stay up at odd hours of the night, Klerman admits.
"However, there are millions of individuals who must stay up late or who do
so unintentionally. It will be necessary for some of us to bother ourselves
in order to better prepare for, care for, or otherwise assist them.
