Adolescent sleep patterns deserve
particular attention because of their
potential to affect school performance.
Adolescents typically get significantly
less sleep than younger children, not
because they need less sleep but
because their schedule and biorhythms
impede adequate sleep. Researchers
studying the optimal sleep periods of
adolescents have found that under
controlled conditions (e.g., with no
clocks and lighting cues), adolescents
typically sleep nine hours a night
(Carskadon, 2002). Although research
indicates that adolescents require at
least as much sleep as they did as preteens, 8.5–9.25 hours per night, fewer
than 15% of adolescents report that
they sleep at least 8.5 hours on school
nights and more than 25% report that
they get less than 6.5 hours of sleep
on school nights (National Sleep
Foundation, 2000). Thus, a large
number of adolescents are constantly
coping with “sleep debt” during the
school year.