An Introduction to Morningness-Eveningness

Abstract

People have a tendency to organize their behavior into cycles of activity and rest (Moore, 1995), and arc different from one another in the way they practice this organization. What is intriguing about these cycles is that they actually represent a very familiar phenomenon to most of us. We all seem to be aware of the fact that some people are night owls, and like to stay up late at night and sleep late in the morning, while others are early birds, and prefer to go to bed at an early hour and arise with the break of dawn. In scientific language this phenomenon is called Momingness-Eveningness (M-E), and can be defined as individual differences in sleep-wake patterns, and the time of day people feel and perform best. Here, the night owls are labeled Evening types, early birds are labeled Morning types, and in between we find a majority of people called Neutral types.