Why do I always want to stick my feet out of the quilt when I sleep?

It is said that "cover the belly button and leave the feet outside" is a "quilt-covering gene" engraved in the bones of Chinese people. There are many tricks involved.

When sleeping, the temperature of the sleeping microenvironment composed of skin, quilt, etc. is more important than the room temperature. Generally speaking, the skin temperature suitable for sleeping is between 34 and 35 degrees Celsius , and the quilt temperature is between 31 and 33 degrees Celsius . To accurately control this temperature fluctuation range of 1 to 2 degrees Celsius is somewhat too specific and precise for people who just want to close their eyes and have a good sleep.

Therefore, when thermometers were not yet invented, the "quilt gene" instructed us to control the temperature by sticking our feet out of the quilt, because the human body will become hotter and hotter under the quilt, and the human body's own temperature regulation system will make people unconsciously stick their feet out of the quilt to dissipate heat.

So why doesn’t the “quilt-covering gene” allow us to directly lift the quilt to cool down quickly? This is because people are in the tangled moment of “hot under the quilt, cold without the quilt”.

If the body temperature drops by just 1°C, the body can enter a good sleeping state, and the fine-tuning of extending or retracting the feet is more precise and non-irritating.

If you still feel cold even when wrapped tightly in a quilt in the middle of winter, how will the "quilt-covering gene" deal with it? It's simple: add a blanket!

But to achieve the maximum warmth-keeping effect, you can't just pile up blankets and quilts and cover yourself with them. Quilts are usually made of fluffier materials, and when the body dissipates heat and transfers it to the quilt, the quilt can expand and store more hot air, and then return the heat to the human body, thus playing a role in keeping warm.

Compared with quilts, blankets usually have fewer spaces between fibers, making it difficult to dissipate heat after storing it, and are not as warm as covering yourself with a quilt.

Therefore, if you want to cover yourself with a blanket and a quilt at the same time, it is warmer to use the quilt underneath and the blanket on top than vice versa.

Another way to keep warm is to sleep in the middle. Although there are few spaces between the fibers of a blanket, it and a quilt both have the effect of storing heat. If a person sleeps between the two, they can achieve a double effect of locking in warmth.

This method of covering is recommended for friends in areas without heating. As for places with too strong heating... it is still recommended to change to a thin quilt, which will help you sleep better.

Planning and production

Source: CCTV News

Review | Zhao Wei, Chief Physician, Department of Neurology, Tianjin University TEDA Hospital

Editor: Yang Yaping

Proofread by Xu Lailinlin

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