Tired and in a bad mood? Science explains why we sometimes stand on our left foot

Did you stand up with your left foot? It's not an untreatable condition, and may simply be due to lack of sleep, as a new international study has revealed. Reduced quality or quantity of sleep can harm emotional functioning, affect positive mood, and put individuals at greater risk for developing symptoms of anxiety.

“In our largely sleep-deprived society, measuring the effects of poor sleep on emotions is crucial to promoting mental health“, explains Dr. Kara Palmer from Montana State University (USA), lead author of the study, In a press release.

“This study represents the most comprehensive synthesis of experimental research on sleep and emotion to date, and provides strong evidence that long periods of wakefulness, reduced sleep duration, and night-time awakenings negatively impact human emotional functioning.“, she adds.

This work brings together at least five decades of research on poor sleep and mood, and is based on an analysis of data from 154 studies including 5,717 participants.