Unwind: The Science of Rest, Relaxation and Sleep

How to sleep better, change unhelpful thought processes and tackle everyday stress and anxiety.

Stress and anxiety strike almost everyone from time-to-time. It can be made worse by lack of sleep, the wrong mindset and unwanted intrusive thoughts.

Over the past few years here on PsyBlog I’ve covered many studies which help us better understand stress and anxiety.

The collection of articles below describe how to sleep better, change unhelpful thought processes and tackle everyday stress and anxiety.

• The Peaceful Mind: 5 Step Guide to Feeling Relaxed Fast – Five simple things that everyone can do to relax including awareness, breathing control, activities and sleep skills. This plan has been developed and tested by psychologists.

• 6 Easy Steps to Falling Asleep Fast – Psychological research over three decades demonstrates the power of Stimulus Control Therapy. Learn the six straightforward steps that will help you sleep better at night.

• Rethinking The Stress Mindset: Can You Find The Upside of Pressure? – Evidence that how we think about stress partly determines how we react to it.

• Can Everyday Hassles Make You Depressed? – Study showing that how people reacted to the little stressors of everyday life predicted whether they developed psychological problems a decade later. Do you sweat the small stuff?

• Perform Better Under Stress Using Self-Affirmation – Under stress most people perform worse, but a simple self-affirmation exercise can help improve your performance.

• Venting Emotions After Trauma Predicts Worse Outcomes – The hydraulic theory of the emotions is a misleading metaphor.

• 8 Ironic Effects of Thought Suppression – The more we try to avoid screwing up when stressed, the more likely it becomes.

• 8 Ways to Defeat Persistent Unwanted Thoughts – Techniques for dealing with unwanted thoughts including focused distraction, thought postponement, acceptance and meditation.

• Feeling Anxious? 5 Scientifically Proven Relaxation Techniques – Learn how to achieve a relaxed and focused state.

• Bad Night’s Sleep? Blame the Full Moon – People often complain of worse sleep around the full moon, but until now scientists have been skeptical.

• “Hidden Caves” in the Brain Open Up During Sleep to Wash Away Toxins – “Hidden caves” that open up in the brain may help explain sleep’s amazing restorative powers.

• Later School Start Times Improve Sleep and Daytime Functioning in Adolescents – How much extra sleep can make a difference to adolescent depression?

About the author

Psychologist, Jeremy Dean, PhD is the founder and author of PsyBlog. He holds a doctorate in psychology from University College London and two other advanced degrees in psychology.

He has been writing about scientific research on PsyBlog since 2004. He is also the author of the book “Making Habits, Breaking Habits” (Da Capo, 2003) and several ebooks.

SOURCE: PSYBLOG