Poor sleep in middle age is often blamed on getting older, but new research points to work stress and life balance as the real culprits — a useful heads-up for anyone over 50 still working.

• A year-long study of 45 workers aged 50-66 found job stress, work-life balance, and workplace mood are closely tied to how well people sleep.
• Wrist trackers showed the problem is often broken, interrupted sleep and waking at night — not just too few hours — leaving people tired the next day.
• Daytime work stress disrupts sleep, which drags down energy and, over time, overall happiness.
• A friendly work atmosphere was strongly linked to better mental well-being.
• The same work or sleep changes affect different people differently, so tracking your own long-term patterns matters more than comparing to averages.

Outlook: Wearables paired with self-check-ins are likely to become a bigger part of healthy aging, though larger studies are still needed to confirm the findings.