These factors suggest there is more to consider than just sleep.

None of the experts we spoke with suggested that people with owl schedules who get restful sleep each night, eat a healthy diet, exercise, form meaningful social connections and get some sunlight each day were at significant risk of an overall decline in their general health, or an early death, based solely on their sleep schedule.

Dr. Knutson acknowledged as much in the study’s conclusion.

Sleep habits are changing with time and technology

In the 1735 edition of Poor Richard’s Almanac, Benjamin Franklin wrote: “Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.” People at the time agreed, if mostly out of necessity. Electricity was more than a century away and the jobs of the era were primarily in farming, ranching and manufacturing — all of which typically took place outdoors.

Owls of the period were seen as lazy and unmotivated, the types who frequented bars, brothels and jail cells, often sleeping late into the day. At the time, societal views of owls revolved mostly around the notion that they were to be avoided at all costs, Stephen Innes wrote in his book “Creating the Commonwealth: The Economic Culture of Puritan New England.”

Two centuries passed and not much changed. A 1942 Gallup poll reported that only 3 percent of Americans slept fewer than five hours a night, with most households averaging 7.9 hours.

Owls represented a statistical anomaly; they were outliers who weren’t, and perhaps still aren’t, well understood. Franklin’s adage had become so ingrained that even the advent of electricity couldn’t keep Americans’ heads off their pillows each night. But that was about to change.

By 1954, more than half of American households owned at least one television set. By the early ’90s, we’d reached the same milestone for the personal computer. And just a few years later, more than half the country was connected to the internet.

In 2013, Gallup revisited the poll. This time, those sleeping fewer than five hours a night had ballooned to 14 percent. On average, Americans were sleeping less than ever, just 6.8 hours a night.