Don’t forget to turn your clocks back one hour as daylight savings time officially ends and standard time kicks in at 2 a.m. on Sunday morning. Here is a suggested turn your clocks back one hour before bed tonight.
What is Daylight Savings Time?
Daylight Saving Time, or DST, is that time of the year when clocks are moved one hour forward. In the United States, this effect is to create more sunlit hours in the evening during warmer months. Our clocks are advanced ahead one hour at the beginning of DST, and move them back one hour (“spring forward, fall back”) when we return to Standard Time (ST). The transition from ST to DST has the effect of moving one hour of daylight from the morning to the evening. The transition from DST to ST effectively moves one hour of daylight from the evening to the morning.
Some doctors have said the transition is much easier on your system during the fall and that extra hour of sleep you get in the morning is an added benefit. “This is because our basic circadian rhythm (the ‘body clock’) actually seems to be programmed for a longer than 24 hour day. It runs a little slow,” Dr. Steven Feinsilver, director of the Center for Sleep Medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, told ABC News.
Governments first implemented daylight savings time during World War I and II to save energy for the war effort. Daylight savings in the United States ran from April until mid-October until 2007, when congress adjusted it to begin three weeks earlier and end one week later. Congress hoped the move would save energy costs, but some critics contested it would cause issues for airlines and even dairy farmers, who said the schedule changes disorient their cows.
Most countries observe DST but not Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the Virgini Island and the state of Arizona -the exception is the Navajo Indian Reservation.
Daylight Savings Time Ends Sunday; Fall Back One Hour was originally published on kissrichmond.com
