Expert on biological clocks can discuss problems with daylight saving time
Horacio de la Iglesia is an expert on the biological rhythms of our bodies and our brains. He has studied how school start times affect the sleep patterns and academic performance of teens, how artificial light impacts sleep patterns in both urban and rural settings, how time changes disrupt biological clocks within our brains, and even how human sleep patterns shift with the phases of the moon.
Here is a sample of what de la Igelsia, a professor of biology at the University of Washington, has to say about the upcoming change from standard time to daylight saving time:
“On March 13, we spring forward into daylight saving time. You may think that the extra hour of evening light we gain with DST is good for you. But research shows that the hour of morning light we miss out on under DST is unhealthy for your body and mind.
“Our brains and bodies have evolved in relationship with the sun. Standard time is true ‘solar time’ — the sun is highest in the sky around noon. DST is artificially shifted an hour ahead. Under DST, we ask our brains and bodies to wake up an hour earlier than they are biologically prepared to do so. If you want to stop switching between standard time and DST but you are not sure which one to stick to, it’s easy: according to your biological clocks, for hundreds of thousands of years, the right time is standard time.
“All humans have these innate biological clocks. Even for those of us who live in big cities, our sleep patterns prefer to be in sync with solar time — that is, with standard time — and not whatever our cell phone clocks might say.”
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