Elsevier

Sleep Health

Volume 1, Issue 4, December 2015, Pages 233-243
Sleep Health

National Sleep Foundation’s updated sleep duration recommendations: final report

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sleh.2015.10.004Get rights and content

Abstract

Objective

To make scientifically sound and practical recommendations for daily sleep duration across the life span.

Methods

The National Sleep Foundation convened a multidisciplinary expert panel (“Panel”) with broad representation from leading stakeholder organizations. The Panel evaluated the latest scientific evidence and participated in a formal consensus and voting process. Then, the RAND/UCLA Appropriateness Method was used to formulate sleep duration recommendations.

Results

The Panel made sleep duration recommendations for 9 age groups. Sleep duration ranges, expressed as hours of sleep per day, were designated as recommended, may be appropriate, or not recommended. Recommended sleep durations are as follows: 14-17 hours for newborns, 12-15 hours for infants, 11-14 hours for toddlers, 10-13 hours for preschoolers, 9-11 hours for school-aged children, and 8-10 hours for teenagers. Seven to 9 hours is recommended for young adults and adults, and 7-8 hours of sleep is recommended for older adults. The self-designated basis for duration selection and critical discussions are also provided.

Conclusions

Consensus for sleep duration recommendations was reached for specific age groupings. Consensus using a multidisciplinary expert Panel lends robust credibility to the results. Finally, limitations and caveats of these recommendations are discussed.

Introduction

The question “How much sleep do we need?” is a natural and relevant question, especially for parents of children and teens and for those who care for aging parents. Sleep represents an essential element for health and well-being, including cognitive performance, physiological processes, emotion regulation, physical development, and quality of life. Appropriate sleep duration ranges vary throughout the life span. Currently, no easily accessible, validated method for individuals to measure their sleep exists. Therefore, the public and practitioners must rely on bedtime duration as a surrogate. Consequently, the National Sleep Foundation (NSF) has committed to regularly update its sleep duration recommendations to provide the public up-to-date, scientifically sound information. Unfortunately, the nature and quantity of published work precluded conducting a standard evidence-based medicine meta-analysis for each age grouping. Therefore, a multidisciplinary expert panel (“Panel”) was convened by NSF to review, discuss, and interpret extant literature.

The purpose of the present article is to provide additional information on the conversations transcribed from the Panel’s discussions and appropriateness voting. In addition, the basis by which Panel members made decisions and the issues deemed important to specific age groups are reviewed. Given the breadth of available information on the subject, citations are not provided throughout the paper. Instead, Table 1 catalogs the articles that were given to the panel for consideration during their discussions.

Section snippets

Participants and methods

The methodological details used to produce the sleep duration recommendations appear in Hirshkowitz and colleagues.1 But a brief summary is provided here.

An 18-member multidisciplinary expert Panel, comprised of sleep researchers, physicians, and experts in other areas of medicine, physiology, and science, was assembled by the NSF. Twelve representatives selected by stakeholder organizations and 6 sleep experts appointed by the NSF were included on the Panel. Organizations that sent

Results

Figure 1 illustrates the Panel’s recommendations for sleep. Recommended durations, expressed in hours per day, are shown.

The recommendations consider overall health and well-being, as well as cognitive, emotional, and physical health. Information relating to each age grouping along with the Panel’s considerations and caveats appear below.

Discussion

This analysis considered extant scientific literature, medical literature, and the Panel’s own professional experience. Their interpretation of these data sources produced consensus recommendations for sleep time duration recommendations for each age group. Consequently, the NSF updated its recommendations for sleep durations across the life span.

The “possibly acceptable” range underscores considerable individual variability in sleep durations. The Panel emphasizes that some individuals might

Acknowledgments

Literature review team: John Herman, PhD; David Brown, PhD; and Chelsea Vaughn, PhD.

Research assistants: Jenna Faulkner, Luca Calzoni, Ben Getchell, and Taylor Nelson.

References (2)

Cited by (1296)

  • Sleep duration and all-cause mortality among stroke survivors

    2024, Journal of Stroke and Cerebrovascular Diseases
View all citing articles on Scopus

Endorsed by the National Sleep Foundation, American Association of Anatomists, American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, American Geriatrics Society, American Physiological Society, American Thoracic Society, Gerontological Society of America, Human Anatomy and Physiology Society, and Society for Research in Human Development.

View full text