A Reason Not to Turn Your Cell Phone Off at Night
Daniel Gartenberg developed the Proactive Sleep Alarm Clock. Photo by Nicolas Tan
And now your cell phone can help you sleep better! Mason student Daniel Gartenberg recently developed a smart phone application called the Proactive Sleep Alarm Clock that helps you track the ZZZs you do get and develop a healthier and more productive sleep pattern.
The alarm clock features a settable sleep goal and a sleep diary, which you can use to track the hours you’ve slept or the dreams you’ve had. It also allows you to record personal factors — such as mood, alcohol and medication intake, exercise habits, diet and productivity.
“The behaviors we’ve chosen to include in this application are those most commonly recommended by sleep professionals as the ones you should monitor for healthy and restful sleep,” says Gartenberg. “We’ve already had numerous sleep clinics and sleep professionals express an interest in the application.”
There is also a simple game, inspired by sleep research, called the Vigilance Task that allows you to test how groggy you are upon waking.
“If you play the game as soon as you wake up, you get more points than if it takes you awhile to wake up. Also, the faster you do the task, the faster the target moves on the screen. This makes your score more sensitive so you can see how getting a poor night of sleep may affect your performance.”
The Proactive Sleep Alarm Clock can be downloaded for a small fee for both iPhone and Google Android.
The application has been featured on the CBS “Early Show,” “Discoveries and Breakthroughs inside Science,” and by the National Sleep Foundation, among others. It won the 2009 Schoofs Prize for Creativity, an annual competition at the University of Wisconsin-Madison that rewards innovative and marketable ideas.
Gartenberg believes that developing tools such as these for new technologies is the way to go. “As smart phone technology becomes increasingly ingrained in our everyday lives, we can use these devices as tools for science.”
Jonny Says:
June 14th, 2010 at 3:23 pm
Hey, very cool! I’ve been using Sleep Cycle alarm clock for about 3 months now and noticed a tremendous improvement in my sleep patterns. But, as a fellow GMU student I’ve got to try this out. The additional features you claim to offer could be a great step ahead of Sleep Cycle. I’ll leave some more feedback once I’ve tested it out. Thanks!