Recently, software developers have been quite concerned with our eyes. During the previous year, we have seen many latest night mode updates for iOS and Android smartphones. Moreover, many popular apps have introduced dark mode features. WhatsApp recently announced that it would release the dark mode.
App makers have also introduced many new features. You would have noticed that your mobile device asks whether you want to switch to night mode, during the dark hours. The main purpose of the night mode is to help you sleep. It turns the cool blue light of the screen to the warmer yellow light. It’s a common belief that looking at the cooler light in the night hours could affect your sleep.
However, a study by Dr. Tim Brown from the University of Manchester shows that this advice isn’t correct. The study was done on mice. Moreover, this study proves that using warmer light by day and the dim cooler light by night is more effective and causes less disruption. The main reason behind this is that the dimmer, blue light signals to us that we should sleep, whereas the warmer light tells us that we should stay awake.
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Our body clock uses melanopsin to measure brightness. Melanopsin is a light-sensitive protein in our eyes. Moreover, it also detects the short-wavelength photos faster. That’s how the belief came that blue light has a bigger effect on sleeping patterns.
The researchers in the current study found out that, in comparison to the color spectrum, the display brightness levels affect our body clock more. Thus, the important thing is to lessen the bright light you get exposed to.
In the study, the researchers used the lighting that could adjust color. They found that the blue colors have less effect on the body clock of mice than the bright yellow colors. Dr. Brown says, “We have heard the common view that blue light has the strongest effect on our eyes; however, it is wrong. The blue lights have a lesser effect on us as compared to the equally bright yellow or white light.”
This research by Dr. Brown and his team is groundbreaking. He and his team hope that their research will have an impact on the companies, and they will change their visual displays to ensure healthy sleeping patterns. However, the problem with this study is that it was conducted on mice and not human subjects. However, Dr. Brown says that he believes that the results would be the same in humans too.