Bright Light Therapy - How Day Light Therapy Works

Importance of Light:

Light is essential to maintaining normal, healthy physiology. Exposure to sunrise is key to synchronizing our internal body cycles to the external world (so we sleep when it is dark and are alert during the day).

Modern industrial society began to tamper with this system, though. The loss of natural light - in dark apartments, in the workplace, on shift work, etc. - creates a state of light deprivation, making us vulnerable to depressed mood, sleep problems, fatigue, ability to concentrate, and more. Nature, too, posed a new problem when humans began to migrate north, where winter nights are long and dark.

Light levels as measured in lux vary greatly between indoor and outdoor lighting. You can see from the chart below how easy it is to become light deprived in our modern, indoor society.


Indoor Lighting

Indoors at home 200-500 lux
Indoors at office 400-700 lux


Springtime Lighting on a Clear Day

5:55 Sunrise 750 lux
6:10 a.m. 2,500 lux
6:20 a.m. 5,000 lux
6:40 a.m. 10,000 lux
12:00 Noon 81,000 lux
5:10 p.m. 10,000 lux
5:30 p.m. 5,000 lux
5:40 p.m. 2,500 lux
5:55 Sunset 750 lux


Although researchers do not have firm numbers, a lot of people are light deprived. Symptoms of light deprivation include:

1. Feeling depressed or moody during the fall and winter
2. Fatigue, lack of energy, and difficulty getting up in the morning
3. Problems getting things done (lack of motivation)
4. Reduced social contact (often reduced sexual interest)
5. Cravings for carbohydrates and weight gain

Surveys suggest that as many as 1 in 20 people experience full-blown winter depression in the northern hemisphere, and three times as many experience winter doldrums. Far larger numbers experience nonseasonal depression at some point in their lives, often for years at a time. With the recent findings that light therapy can also work for nonseasonal depression - light itself or in combination with drugs, the size of the responsive population multiplies.

How Light Therapy Works:

Scientists believe that light therapy works on several different levels, producing a combined beneficial effect. When used at an appropriate morning hour (or in rare cases, evening hour), it corrects the misalignment of the internal body clock with external night and day. Light therapy stimulates the brain's production of neurochemicals that are thought to be antidepressant (and in that sense, it mimics drug effects in a more natural way, without the need for drugs). This explains why when people are not getting the light they require, they feel lethargic, less motivated and experience depressed mood.

Although judicious exposure to sunlight - when available - can act like light therapy, this method would not be practical for most people with contemporary lifestyles and careers. The key is to reset the internal biological clock, which begins to run late as the sunrise gets later and later in the fall and winter.

Therefore researchers use light boxes to simulate the effects of daylight. By sitting in front of a light box for about 20-30 minutes, the brain is tricked into thinking you are in the brighter part of the day. Optimum light therapy usually works best the first thing in the morning, shortly after awakening.

With thousands of people having tested bright light therapy, three important facts emerged:

Debilitating, full-blown Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) can be reversed within days of appropriate treatment - an unprecedented result never achieved by antidepressant drugs.
People with milder winter doldrums - who can cope, but still suffer - respond just as well to light therapy as those with major mood disorders.

People feeling down in the dumps at other times of year - or even with continuous, chronic mood disorder - also respond to light therapy. (Just think of the time a person spends in dim indoor light.)

So as a drug-free, low-risk treatment option, light therapy is a good place to start.

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