According to one study, women’s moods and attitudes toward advancing in their careers were affected by their sleep quality. Meanwhile, sleep quality had no effect on men’s ambitions. The researchers discovered this finding after conducting a two-week survey of 135 full-time workers in the United States. Each day, participants noted how well they had slept and the quality of their current mood, and then later in the day, how they felt about pursuing more status and responsibility at work.
Over the course of the study, both men and women reported good and poor sleep quality, with no gender difference in reported sleep quality. Women, on the other hand, reported lower intentions to advance in their careers on days following a night of poor sleep.
If women want to lean in to work, they should first get a good night’s sleep. A study led by Washington State University found that sleep quality affected women’s mood and how they felt about advancing in their careers. Meanwhile, sleep quality had no effect on men’s aspirations.
This discovery was made by the researchers during a two-week survey of 135 workers in the United States. Each day, participants recorded how well they had slept and the quality of their current mood, and then later in the day, how they felt about pursuing more status and responsibility at work.
When women are getting a good night’s sleep and their mood is boosted, they are more likely to be oriented in their daily intentions toward achieving status and responsibility at work. If their sleep is poor and reduces their positive mood, then we saw that they were less oriented toward those goals.
Leah Sheppard
“When women are getting a good night’s sleep and their mood is boosted, they are more likely to be oriented in their daily intentions toward achieving status and responsibility at work,” said lead author Leah Sheppard, an associate professor in WSU’s Carson College of Business. “If their sleep is poor and reduces their positive mood, then we saw that they were less oriented toward those goals.”
For the study published in the journal Sex Roles, Sheppard and co-authors Julie Kmec of WSU and Teng Iat Loi of University of Minnesota-Duluth surveyed full-time employees twice a day for two consecutive work weeks for a total of more than 2,200 observations. The participants answered questions about their previous night’s sleep and current mood around noon every day and in the evenings answered questions about their intentions to pursue more responsibility, status, and influence at work.
Both men and women reported good and bad sleep quality over the course of the study, notably with no gender difference in reported sleep quality. However, women more often reported lowered intentions to pursue more status at work on days following a night of poor sleep.
The researchers can only speculate on why sleep affects women’s aspirations but not men’s, but they suspect it may be due to gender differences in emotion regulation as well as societal expectations or some combination of these forces.
Women have greater emotional reactivity and less emotion regulation than men, according to neuroscience research, which can be reinforced by cultural stereotypes of women as more emotional. At the same time, stereotypes of men as being more ambitious than women likely add more pressure for them to climb the corporate ladder, so poor sleep quality may be less likely to deter men from pursuing their work goals.
However, Sheppard believes that the findings are encouraging for women who want to advance in their careers. For example, they might take some practical steps to improve their work aspirations, such as practicing meditation to help with both sleep and emotion regulation, setting better work hours, and, of course, simply striving to get more sleep.
“It’s critical to be able to connect aspirations to something happening outside of the work environment that is controllable,” she said. “There are many things that anyone can do to get a better night’s sleep and regulate their mood in general.”
