Effects of Different Nocturnal Lighting Stimuli on Melatonin, Sleep and Cognitive Performance of Workers in Confined Spaces

Abstract

Exposure to light during overtime work at night in confined spaces may disrupt the normal circadian clock, affect hormone secretion, sleep quality and performance, thereby posing great risks to the physical and mental health of night workers. Integrative lighting should be adopted to reduce the disturbance of normal physiological rhythm, while meeting the visual requirements of work. Through adjustable LED (CCT 6000 K/2700 K) and different vertical illuminance, five lighting patterns with different circadian stimuli (CS = 0.60, 0.30. 0.20, 0.10 and 0.05) were conducted, respectively, in a sleep lab using a within-subject design. Each lighting pattern lasted for 5 h every night. Eight healthy adults were recruited to complete the night work and their salivary melatonin, Karolinska sleepiness scale (KSS), Psychomotor Vigilance Task (PVT) and sleep quality were tested. The results showed that subjective sleepiness and melatonin concentration increased rapidly under low intervention (CS = 0.05) with the best sleep quality, while they decreased in high intervention (CS = 0.60) at night and led to significantly higher levels of sleepiness the next morning (p < 0.05). For the PVT, the middle intervention (CS = 0.30) showed the lowest response time and least errors (p < 0.05), suggesting that appropriate illuminance can improve visual performance. To reduce biorhythm disruptions, lower lighting stimulation is preferred during night work. For difficult visual tasks, high illuminances may not improve visual performance; just a slight increase in the existing lighting levels is adequate. Lighting interventions have a clear impact on sleep improvement and work capacity for those working overtime, and they may be translatable to other shift work scenarios.

Impacts of Static Lighting in Confined Spaces on the Circadian Parameters, Alertness, Performance and Well-Being

“…As melatonin concentration, AUC and DLMO were not normally distributed, Friedman's Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was used. Then the Wilcoxon signed-rank test was used to determine if the difference between days was significant [53]. For the discrete variables, such as KSS, PSQI, HAMD, SAS scores, number of awakenings and errors, the same non-parametric analyses were also used.…”

“…It was collected with saliva collection tubes and centrifuged. A total of 1 mL of supernatant was stored in a cold refrigerator (−40 • C) [44,53]. The saliva ELISA kit from IBL International GmbH was used for the analysis by a professional biological company (Wayen Biotechnologies (Shanghai), Inc., Shanghai, China).…”