Two in five Americans will experience the “dreaded daylight saving time” as they prepare to change their clocks in November.

A survey of 2,000 Americans found that 40% felt a sense of dread as they prepared to “fall back,” a feeling that lasted much longer than the day or two leading up to the time change.

The results showed that this feeling of fear occurs about 11 days before the clocks change – around October 23 this year.

And it will end approximately 13 days after the change, which is November 16th.

The survey, commissioned by Avocado Green Mattress and conducted by Talker Research, revealed the “dreaded daylight saving time” and how respondents feel about changing their clocks.

Regardless of whether they experience the “dreaded daylight saving time,” 59% of respondents would stop switching to and from daylight saving time permanently if they had the option.

And older generations were more inclined to do so: Half of millennials would prefer to end the twice-yearly time change, compared with 69% of baby boomers.

Only a third of respondents (35%) think the fall trade-off—an extra hour of sleep at night instead of less light in the evening—is worth it.

This may be partly due to the fact that 77% of respondents feel more energetic when the sun is shining. But after Daylight Saving Time ends, 70% of people feel like they start and end their day when it’s dark.

“The sudden shift to shorter days and darker nights disrupts our sleep schedules,” said Mark Abrials, director of marketing for Avocado Green Mattress. “Everyone is a little moody, grumpy, moody and lazy.”

Working respondents especially miss daylight (48%) – 54% admit that they experience “sun blues” after the time change, since they are at work all daylight hours.

43% of working respondents also said that the week after Daylight Saving Time ends is their most unproductive week at work, and 31% admitted to making more mistakes than usual.

This includes falling asleep at your desk while typing an email to the company president, showing up late for work after not changing the clock the night before, and adding salt to your coffee instead of sugar.

About a fifth of respondents said changing clocks interferes with their sleep schedule (21%).

So it’s perhaps not surprising that 37% of respondents need more sleep in the days or weeks after daylight saving time ends, regardless of their employment status.

And these respondents needed an extra hour and 24 minutes to feel rested.

“The fall time transition can be very difficult,” said Amy Seaman, account manager for Avocado Green Mattress. “Early darkness can cause us to become tired early and become sedentary, missing out on fun activities and time outdoors.”

Survey methodology:

Talker Research surveyed 2,000 Americans who are adopting daylight saving time; The survey was commissioned by Avocado Green Mattress and conducted online by Talker Research between October 3 and October 7, 2024.

We use a non-probabilistic approach and we use two main sources:

● Traditional online panels, where respondents agree to participate in online market research as an incentive.

● Programmatic – where respondents are online and have the opportunity to take a survey to receive a virtual incentive, usually related to the online activity they are engaged in.

Those who were not included in the specified sample were excluded from the survey. The survey uses dynamic online sampling to adjust targeting to achieve quotas specified in the sampling plan.

Regardless of which source the respondent came from, they were redirected to an online survey where the survey was conducted in English; The link to the survey can be shared upon request. Respondents were awarded points for participating in the survey. These points have little monetary value.

Cells are submitted for analysis only if they have a minimum of 80 respondents and statistical significance is calculated at the 95% level. The data is not weighted, but quotas and other parameters are set to achieve the desired sample.

Interviews are excluded from the final analysis if they do not pass quality control. This includes:

● Accelerators: Respondents who complete the survey faster than one-third of the average interview length are disqualified as violators.

● Open-ended responses: All verbatim responses (full open-ended questions as well as other options, please specify) are screened for inappropriate or irrelevant text.

● Bots: Surveys have Captcha enabled, allowing the research team to identify and disqualify bots.

● Duplicates: The survey software has a digital fingerprint-based deduplication feature to ensure that no one is allowed to complete the survey more than once.

It is worth noting that this survey was only available to individuals with Internet access, and the results may not be generalizable to those without Internet access.