In a recent issue of Sleep Savvy Magazine there was an article called “10 curious facts about sleep”. I really enjoyed it and thought I’d share a few with you, including a few more I’ve recently come across.
1. The record for the longest period of time without sleep is 18 days, 21 hours, 40 minutes (during a rocking chair marathon). The record holder reported hallucinations, paranoia, blurred vision, slurred speech, and lapses in memory and concentration.
2. If it takes you less than five minutes to fall asleep at night, you’re sleep-deprived. The ideal is 10 to 15 minutes, which means you’re tired enough to sleep deeply, but not so exhausted you feel sleepy during the day.
3. Having a new baby typically results in 400-750 hours of lost sleep for parents in the first year.
4. After five nights of partial sleep deprivation, three drinks will have the same effect on your body as six would when you’ve slept enough.
5. Snoring occurs only in non-REM sleep,
6. Teenagers need as much sleep as small children (about 10 hours). For the average adult aged 25-55, eight hours is generally considered optimal. Source: The National Sleep Research Project (Australia).
Here are a few more I’ve come across:
7. The 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill off Alaska, the Challenger space shuttle disaster and the Chernobyl nuclear accident have all been attributed to human errors in which sleep-deprivation played a role.
8. The NRMA estimates fatigue is involved in one in 6 fatal road accidents.
9. Exposure to noise at night can suppress immune function even if the sleeper doesn’t wake. Unfamiliar noise, and noise during the first and last two hours of sleep, has the greatest disruptive effect on the sleep cycle.
10. In insomnia following bereavement, sleeping pills can disrupt grieving.
11. Ducks at risk of attack by predators are able to balance the need for sleep and survival, keeping one half of the brain awake while the other slips into sleep mode. (If only human mothers could do this!)
12. Some studies suggest women need up to an hour’s extra sleep a night compared to men, and not getting it maybe one reason women are much more susceptible to depression than men.
13. As a group, 18 to 24 year-olds deprived of sleep suffer more from impaired performance than older adults.
14. Experts say one of the most alluring sleep distractions is the 24-hour accessibility to the internet.
I love weird, interesting, surprising, curious, and funny facts about sleep. Have you come across any lately you would like to share?
By Emily S.
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