good nights sleep

Research Finds That Brexit Is The Number-One Cause of Sleeplessness in the UK

Is Brexit keeping you up at night? Confused by the never-ending news stories and political drama? Well, you’re not alone, as research by British bed manufacturer Happy Beds has found that Brexit is the number-one cause of sleeplessness in the UK.

The retailer’s analysis of over 30,000 insomnia-related tweets and posts found that Brexit and the related confusion around it has caused Brits to lose sleep more than any other topic over the last 12 months.

The #stopbrexit hashtag, for example, was found to be the most common hashtag in posts where social media users complained about insomnia or sleeplessness. With Brexit pushed back to January, this sleeplessness and uncertainty will loom.

In addition to that, ‘Brexit’, ‘United Kingdom’ and the ‘European Union’ were three of the top five terms which featured in insomnia-related social posts. A mix of discussion, venting and arguments were the common themes across these posts with most Brits sleeping with Brexit on the brain.

Joy Richards, Sleep Expert at Happy Beds, said:

“At Happy Beds, we believe everyone needs and deserves a good night’s sleep. So, in a bid to help our customers get a better kip, we delved into social data to see what really keeps people up at night.

“Of course, if you can’t sleep then we would definitely recommend staying away from social media, because the ‘blue light’ emitted from phones and electronic devices actually suppresses melatonin, the chemical which helps you sleep.

“Whilst we cannot do much to ease the population’s anxiety over the current political climate, Happy Beds can provide comfort and support to facilitate sleep.”

In addition to the Brexit discovery, the research found other topics including football, Game of Thrones and Netflix to be commonly used in conjunction with sleeplessness-related posts.

To discover all the findings, check out the Happy Beds social insomnia research directly.