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We had this idea that by wearing socks to bed a person would get a better night's sleep. After all, we bundle our newborns up and put booties on them - and they sleep like babies. The idea had been bouncing around for a few years and we had an opportunity to test the idea. We enrolled 32 people to participate in our study. The participants were asked to wear socks and to warm the foot of their bed with a hot water bottle. They are very inexpensive and last a long time. Just add hot tap water before bed and you're all set.
We discovered that warm feet, and wearing socks to bed equates to better sleep.
Our data report sheet was divided into two sections - a 3 week period where the socks and warming bag were used and a 7 day period where the person was forgo using the warming bag or wearing socks. Here are the numbers.
- The participants were asked to rate their sleep as "better than usual” or "about the same as usual”.
- The total score for the "better than usual" responses was 292.
- The score for the "about the same as usual" group was 100.
Wearing socks and having warm feet resulted in almost three times (actually 2.92) better sleep - according to our scale. Then we looked at the 7 days when the participants did not have warm feet. The participants wanted their foot warmers and socks back - by a margin of 2.68 to 1.
There you have it - if you wear socks to bed and keep your feet nice and warm you will probably sleep a whole lot better.
Keep in mind I don't recommend electric blankets because of the controversy around electromagnetic fields generated by the heating elements in the blankets.
Why does wearing socks make sleeping better? I don't know for sure - but I have a couple of ideas. For one, when a person sleeps in a cold place - or on a waterbed, that has cool water - their body needs to work to generate heat. That's work during a time when we should be resting. It isn't good to try to work and rest at the same time. Therefore, the work during sleep time interferes with the restfulness we need. In addition, it has been shown that being insufficiently warm causes us to toss and turn more - and that also means less rest.
One additional "warmth" issue. If you are follicularly challenged (balding to bald), wear something on your head. There is a lot of heat lost through the top of the head.
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