Exercise for a Good Night's Sleep

Nearly everyone makes excuses for missing workouts, and nearly just as many people make excuses for not prioritizing another key to healthy living: Sleep. Making exercise and sleeping seven to nine hours a daily part of your life can help reduce the risk for obesity, diabetes, heart disease, stroke and even some cancers. It makes sense that burning more energy during the day should translate to a better night's sleep. Now, a new study on exercise's effect on children has found that there may be an exercise-to-sleep formula.

Published in the Archives of Disease in Childhood, the study centered on the time it took each child to fall asleep -- also called sleep latency. Researchers found that every hour spent being sedentary increased sleep latency by approximately three minutes. In contrast, each hour of vigorous activity, such as running, reduced the time it took to fall asleep by nearly six minutes. The study's results also showed that children who fell asleep faster slept longer.

Additional studies on adults have shown that exercise has a similar effect on sleep patterns. In one particular study, aerobic exercise improved the sleep quality of insomniacs. If patients walked or jogged on the treadmill for 50 minutes a few hours before bedtime, they fell asleep quicker, woke up less often during the night and increased their total sleep time.

If you're already devoted to your exercise regimen and still have trouble sleeping, consider trying these tricks for falling asleep or natural sleep remedies from AOL Health.