ArticleCommunications psychology2025
Relationships between light exposure and aspects of cognitive function in everyday life.
Article in Communications psychology, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed.
- Acute lack of sunlight exposure is associated with poorer cognitive test performance: evidence from two national cohorts in the United Kingdom.Photochemical & photobiological sciences : Official journal of the European Photochemistry Association and the European Society for Photobiology · 2026Article
- Analysis of real-world eye level light exposure through spectacle lens.Npj biological timing and sleep · 2026Article
- A lipid-binding protein that boosts daytime wake is mainly located at the body surface and blocks light-induced lipid peroxidation in the brain.Current biology : CB · 2026Article
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Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
9 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Light exposure can modulate cognitive function, yet its effects outside of controlled laboratory settings remain insufficiently explored. To examine the relationship between real-world light exposure and cognitive performance, we assessed personal light exposure and measured subjective sleepiness, vigilance, working memory, and visual search performance over 7 days of daily life, in a convenience sample of UK adults (n = 58) without significant circadian challenge (shiftwork or jet-lag). A subset of participants (n = 41) attended an in-lab session comprising a battery of pupillometric and psychophysical tests aimed to quantify melanopsin-driven visual responses. We find significant associations between recent light exposure and subjective sleepiness. Recent light exposure was also associated with reaction times for both psychomotor vigilance and working memory tasks. In addition, higher daytime light exposure and an exposure pattern with reduced fragmentation were linked to improved cognitive performance across visual search, psychomotor vigilance, and working memory tasks. Higher daytime light exposure and earlier estimated bedtimes were associated with stronger relationships between recent light exposure and subjective sleepiness. These results provide real world support for the notion that intra- and inter-individual differences in light exposure meaningfully influence aspects of cognition, with beneficial effects of short-term bright light and of habitual light exposure patterns characterized by brighter daytimes, earlier rest phase, and greater intra- and inter-daily stability.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.