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gwern comments on Case study: Melatonin - Less Wrong
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I tried it for a few weeks and didn't notice any major difference. I think I'll try again on this recommendation. Perhaps my endogenous melatonin is already sufficient, or I was a lazy self-monitor.
I would summarize:
(1) In your personal experience, 1.5mg of melatonin 30 min before sleeping makes you feel 8-hours rested after 7-hours of sleep (but 9mg is harmful)
(2) that dosage has negligible cost
That's all you really needed to say.
It's jarring to me that you so meticulously analyze the cost of dosing with melatonin; once I know a cost is below some low threshold, I prefer not to think about it at all. I'd rather you took the same care into performing some objective tests of mental capability on varying amounts of sleep, so that it really means something when you say you gain an hour of wakefulness. Of course, I'd want this blinded as well, but I doubt you have convincing placebo pills available; besides, I don't mind taking something in hope of accruing some real and placebo benefits.
If your experience is typical, then the only reason people shouldn't be dosing melatonin is if there's some long-term health detriment (I don't have any mechanism in mind; it seems unlikely).
BTW, I did wind up measuring sleep over 6 months of on/off melatonin, so I now have more than intuition for the 1-hour claim (which turns out to be more like 50 minutes): http://www.gwern.net/Zeo#melatonin-analysis
Very impressive followup. I've skimmed that.
My less meticulous conclusion is that melatonin makes me wake earlier and easier with light (maybe in general, but I don't wake by alarm). I haven't bothered to check whether that means I actually slept better (in terms of improving my performance/mood going forward), but I consider it a good sign.
So you are still using it?
About 2 in every 7 days - when I feel like my past night's misadventures might make it hard for me to sleep and wake properly. So no, not really. If I lived alone, I'd probably be more regimented and go for 7/7 with some tiny dose (because stable habits that can be tweaked gradually are reassuring).
Based on my experience, I'd recommend it if you want to wake up "naturally" with the light but your recent sleep history (e.g. jet lag) wouldn't permit that. Otherwise, I've been too sloppy to know precisely what it does for me (I can feel a large dose, such that I'd guarantee it's not only placebo).