For Better Sleep, Try Listening To Your Partner

Here’s a non-altruistic reason to start paying attention when your partner shares good news: you’ll both sleep better, according to research presented at the Society for Personality and Social Psychology Convention.

The research, led by Sarah Arpin, PhD, an assistant professor of psychology at Gonzaga University, studied 162 married or cohabiting heterosexual military couples, meaning one partner served in active duty in the Army reserves or National Guard. The couples completed daily online surveys for about a month, answering questions about their general well-being, including the subjects of loneliness and intimacy. They also reported whether they shared good news with their significant other that day, how it was received, and how they’d slept.

Researchers found that on days when participants shared good news — and when they felt their good news was truly being listened to — they fell asleep faster and slept better. On these days, participants also reported lower levels of loneliness and increased levels of intimacy, both predictors of their sleep quality that night.

The results seem dependent on being actively listened to. That means: if your partner is scrolling through Facebook as you tell them about a raise, you may not sleep better.

“It may be common sense that we all want to share with our partners when good things happen,” Arpin says, “but the real lesson here is that doing so can have a stronger impact on your health than you might realize.”