Why Do College Students Stay Up So Late Instead of Waking Up Early?
Many college students, especially freshmen, stay up way too late. For some students, staying up late becomes a badge of honor or a way to connect with other tired students.
In reality, staying up late almost always hinders you in college. It doesn’t help you handle your rigorous schedule, focus in class, study well, make good food choices, or perform well on tests.
The worst part about this lifestyle of staying up until the early hours of the morning is that it is entirely preventable. If you learn to manage your college schedule better, you can finally get to bed and wake up at a decent time.
If you over and over again fail to go to bed early, you likely struggle in one of the following 5 ways:
You don’t use you time well during the day.
College students, especially freshmen, waste so much valuable time during the day. They might be scrolling through social media, browsing the internet, watching Hulu, etc. Because they mismanage their time, they have to stay up late to complete their homework.
Before you point the finger at another student with much worse time management skills, take some time to consider how you spend your day. Tonight before you go to bed, sit down and log how you spent your time today. Include every social media break, trip to grab coffee, etc.
You might waste more time than you think. By logging how you spend your time on a daily basis, you are bound to find time that you could be using much better.
Make a plan to use your time better throughout the day. Managing your time better will help you actually plan out each day to include time for the fun parts of college too.
You procrastinate.
Maybe you’re nervous or just stuck, but for whatever reason you put off you homework. You may even spend your time on other worthwhile things—like building relationships—but you repeatedly put off homework until it’s late at night.
Sometimes procrastination can be a coping mechanism for perfectionists or for freshman year anxieties. Do some soul-searching. Why do you procrastinate? Is it because you’re not sure how to get started? Is it because you are afraid of failing?
After you identify the source of your procrastination, make an action plan to deal with the real problem. Maybe you need to ask your professor questions earlier. Maybe you need to get started on the project or paper earlier. Maybe you need to lower your standards.
Get some accountability for your plan, and stick to it! You can beat this bad habit of procrastinating once and for all.
You spend their night hours socializing.
During the day, you have required events like classes, labs, rehearsals, etc.. In the evening, you finally have the freedom to spend time with your friends. You often choose to prioritize friends over getting homework done or sleeping.
Friendships are important. You should be making the time to build relationships with people in your dorm, in your classes, in your major, etc. However, friendships aren’t the most important part of your college education.
You’re at college primarily to learn, develop skills, and grow as a person. Prioritize the most important parts of your education before you do the fun things you really want to do.
And to those who rarely socialize, be sure you do. You’re more likely to remember friendships than letter grades.
You are overcommitted.
College provides so many wonderful opportunities, but if you’re not careful you’ll quickly become overcommitted. Learning to say “no” can be difficult, but it is necessary if you want to stay healthy and get good grades.
How do you know if you’re overcommitted? You might be overcommitted if you rarely have time to eat meals, you get less than 5 hours of sleep, or you hardly ever socialize outside of a required event (meeting, lab, rehearsal, etc.).
At this point of the semester, you may not be able to pull out of some of your responsibilities. Regardless, take some time to look at the things you do on a regular basis. How many of these things are required for your course load or your major?
If you are stressed, overwhelmed, and unable to perform like you need to in major classes and other required classes, reconsider these responsibilities. Doing more doesn’t make you a better person. Doing more simply makes you a busier person.
You have noisy roommates.
Some roommates are honestly not aware of how their behavior impacts you. Some roommates honestly don’t care about how their behavior affects you. While your roommate may be less than considerate, your roommate may be the reason you struggle to get sleep at a decent time.
If your roommate is simply unaware, talk to him or her kindly about some of your frustrations. If your roommate doesn’t care, consider talking to your RA. Your RA can likely help you find the words or support you in this chat.
Be prepared to realize you may need to make some changes too. Your roommate may become defensive or point back at some of your unpleasant habits. Approach the situation, knowing that you likely have areas you can improve and areas in which you can compromise.
Most of the time staying up late in college can be prevented. You can prevent the typical college exhaustion by using your time wisely, refusing to procrastinate, learning to say “no,” and talking to your noisy roommate
