Week 5: Progress in methodology and literature paper

Welcome to my new post for this project. In the previous post, I delved into the typical factors used to assess the quality of an individual’s sleep. As I reach out to potential subjects for data collection, I am also making progress in writing my literature paper. In this post, I will primarily be discussing the progress made in the literature paper, as well as discussing the status of the questionnaire that will be distributed to the subjects. 

In the previous post, I discussed my completion of an introduction to the literature paper. It begins with a brief explanation of light pollution. The concept of light pollution is then tied to its negative consequences, and the consequence of a potentially negatively affected sleep quality is highlighted. The importance of sleep is briefly mentioned, and a short explanation of how light pollution could negatively affect natural sleep patterns is provided. The goals of this project are then described. This introduction allows a smooth transition into the rest of the paper, specifically the literature review section, which follows the introduction section. 

I have been working on the literature review section. The literature review section is divided into three subsections: sleep quality, light pollution, and the connection between sleep quality and light pollution. For the subsection dedicated to sleep quality, I have covered and am still working on the following topics: what sleep is, sleep’s functions in the body, the factors affecting sleep quality, and methods of studying sleep quality. For the subsection dedicated to light pollution, I have covered and am still working on the following topics: what light pollution is, causes of light pollution, increasing prevalence of light pollution, and the consequences of light pollution. For the subsection dedicated to the connection between sleep quality and light pollution, I plan to cover the following topic: the impact of exposure to artificial light on sleep quality with several analyses of relevant research done with animals under this topic. 

After the literature review section is the methodology section. The methodology section will cover the exact steps I have taken to collect and analyze reported sleep quality scores from a sample of subjects that come from varying levels of light pollution. The methodology is still underway, as I am still reaching out to potential subjects. The sleep questionnaire that I will be using will likely be my own, as I have not yet heard a positive nor negative response (in regards to necessary consent for usage of the Sleep Quality Scale) from the lead developer of the SQS, a sleep quality questionnaire I initially planned on using for this project. In the next paragraph, I will describe the primary factors that encompass the questions in my sleep quality questionnaire. 

The sleep quality questionnaire that I made consists of the following factors: sleep duration, restoration after sleep, sleep efficiency, sleep regularity, sleep environment, and lifestyle. Sleep duration refers to the amount of time spent in bed, and this domain would also include circadian preference (preferred time of sleeping). Restoration after sleep refers to the individual’s feeling of well-restedness after waking up from their sleep. Sleep efficiency refers to the amount of time the individual spent sleeping while in bed. Sleep regularity refers to consistency of the individual’s sleep patterns. Sleep environment covers whether the individual sleeps with lights on, listens to music or sleeps through background noise, etc. Lifestyle covers physical and mental health, exposure to artificial lighting vs natural lighting, certain medical conditions or the usage of certain medications, etc. 

I will be finalizing my subjects and sending out the questionnaire to them very soon in order to begin my data collection. I will also be continuing to make progress on my literature paper. I look forward to keeping you updated on this project’s progress. Thank you for reading this post.