Quiz
Can You Spot the Sleep Myth?
Eight claims about sleep. Some are true, some survive purely on repetition. Most people get two or three wrong — including a couple that get repeated by people who should know better.
Sleep advice spreads by repetition rather than evidence, which means a fair amount of what everybody knows is not true.
Eight claims below. Decide whether each one holds up. No trick questions — but a couple of these are repeated constantly by people who ought to know better.
Common questions
Do you really not need eight hours of sleep?
Eight is the middle of a range, not a requirement. Adult sleep need spreads roughly across seven to nine hours and is largely genetic. The useful test is functional: waking without an alarm feeling restored, and getting through the afternoon without needing caffeine.
Is a warm bath before bed good or bad?
Good, with a timing caveat. A warm bath 60 to 90 minutes before bed dilates peripheral blood vessels, so you shed heat afterwards and your core temperature falls faster. Immediately before bed you are simply getting into bed warm.
Are screens really worse than room lighting?
No — the reverse, usually. A phone is a small, dim panel at arm-s length; a ceiling light is several hundred lumens filling your whole visual field for hours. Dimming the room does more than any screen setting.
Not medical advice. This is a self-assessment for general information, not a diagnostic test. If you snore loudly, have witnessed pauses in breathing, gasp awake, or feel exhausted no matter how long you sleep, see a doctor — those warrant a proper assessment rather than a questionnaire.