Only 22 percent of older adolescents now say they sleep at least seven hours a night. That figure comes from a University of Minnesota School of Public Health study, published in Pediatrics, which found that teenagers are sleeping less than at any point on record.
The decline showed up in every age category, and the latest numbers were record lows for all groups.
What the numbers cover
Researchers analyzed Monitoring the Future, a long-running national survey representing more than 400,000 US students in grades eight, 10 and 12 from 1991 through 2023. Students answered two main questions: how often they slept at least seven hours a night, and how often they felt they were getting enough rest.
Sleep time falls steadily as teens get older. Both sleep duration and the feeling of being rested drop sharply between early adolescence and the later teen years, so the oldest students are hit hardest.
The gaps are widening, too. Black and Latino teens, along with adolescents whose parents have less education, are becoming less likely to get adequate sleep than other groups.
Old pressures, new ones
“Some barriers to sleep faced by teens have existed across generations, such as the increased homework and extracurricular demands that come with high school, social pressures to stay up late with peers, and jobs,” said Rachel Widome, the study’s lead author and a professor at the school.
“Other issues, though, are new in recent years, such as increasingly ever-present screens and social media as well as recent society-wide stressors such as the pandemic, social unrest or militarized policing,” she added.
Screens may look like the obvious culprit. The deeper cause could be social isolation and burnout. Research led by high school students at Aim Ideas Lab found that roughly two-thirds of California teens reported burnout and anxiety, and about a quarter said they have time for basic needs such as sleep, eating and hygiene only two days a week or less.
Jolie Delja, executive director of Aim Youth Mental Health, said respondents “connected this directly to relentless academic pressure”. Students asked for time to slow down and to practice coping skills such as breathing and mindfulness. “Schools and communities do not need to invent entirely new solutions,” Delja said. “They need to give students more time and space for the people, activities and coping tools that already help them manage stress, including getting more sleep.”
Insufficient sleep brings everyday exhaustion and poorer functioning. It has also been linked to mental health problems, struggles in school and chronic illness later in adulthood. Other studies have found that teens who go to bed earlier and sleep longer than their peers tend to have sharper mental skills and score better on cognitive tests.
The researchers say no single nationwide fix exists. One broader approach they suggest is moving high school start times to 8.30am or later. “Earlier starts are in direct conflict with preset rhythms of adolescent circadian biology,” Widome said. “A nation of sleep-deprived adolescents is not inevitable.”
Families worried about a teenager’s sleep should talk to their doctor.
