Paraphrasing an essay

Sleep Deprived

When it comes to the amount of sleep the average human should get on a daily basis there tends to be a bit of disagreement. It is commonly accepted that we should be getting at least eight hours of sleep but the reality is that most people fail to do so. Some of us can go to work or school with less sleep than others but what exactly does a lack of sleep do to our health? Sleep deprivation can be described as simply the lack of sleep and recent studies claim that this can have a serious effect on an individual’s cognitive and physical functions while performing daily tasks. Despite the fact that many people proudly claim that they can get by on 6, 5, or even fewer hours of sleep, not getting enough sleep can affect an individual’s health both physically and mentally.

The first significant findings on sleep deprivation were researched by an individual named Nathaniel Kleitman (2013) who is also known as the “father of sleep research” 2013. Before Kleitman ventured off into the field of sleep there appeared to be huge blind spot in the science of physiology. The reason for this is simply because the human body was thought to be in the same state while it was asleep as it was when an individual was dead. There is little information on why exactly Kleitman decided to challenge this position but it is highly suggested that his motivation stemmed from his experiences with pogroms during the First World War that eventually forced him to move to New York. One of his first research experiments consisted of keeping a dozen subjects awake for days and then forced them to perform physical and psychological tests. He even went as far as to use himself as a subject and stayed up for one hundred and fifteen hours straight (1). Although no significant findings resulted from this, this work would eventually result in him being granted a sponsor to continue researching this field. This sponsor was a meatpacking company that was interested in determining whether or not a rich diet in protein would cause babies to fall asleep more soundly. With the help of one of his graduate students, Kleitman was able to discover what is known as “rapid eye movement” or REM sleep. The two became pioneers in the study of sleep, which had become a true scientific field thanks to their work. The discovery of REM introduced the different stages of sleep. For example, during stage 1 of the sleep cycle an individual can be woken up by a slight noise but during stage 3 he could remain asleep during a loud crash. Elizabeth Kolbert mentions that in 2003 an expert in this field claimed that we were entering the golden age of sleep research as a result of technology for studying sleep becoming cheaper, easier, and less intrusive (1). Despite his efforts, Kleitman did not have the technologies of today so it is fair to say that his findings were limited. Thanks to his interest in sleep, we are barely beginning to understand the science of sleep and the effects that sleep deprivation have on the human body and mind. Let us continue by examining some recent studies that support the idea that a diet of little sleep can result in a body that is deprived of its mental and physical capabilities.

While many people think that getting by on a few hours of sleep each night make them more productive at work, one study found that overall sleep deprivation strongly impairs human function. June J. Pilcher and Allen I. Huffcut (2006), from the department of psychology at Bradley University conducted a meta-analysis to summarize the work of 19 original studies on sleep deprivation. Using mathematics the research analyzed 1,932 samples and 143 coefficients in order to summarize these findings. At the time of the study, approaching this subject using meta-analysis, which can best be described as statistical analysis of a large collection of analysis, was relatively new in this field of research. For decades researchers focused merely on studies based on a combination of personal feeling, tastes, and opinions. The meta-analysis approach presented new information that was deemed useful. It was concluded that sleep deprivation did in fact result in decreased reaction times, less vigilance, and also an increase in perceptual and cognitive distortion. To arrive at this conclusion, the research compared the performance of sleep-deprived subjects to non-sleep-deprived subjects. Time and time again it was found that the sleep-deprived subjects scored less in terms of levels of performance. In summary, the study confirmed that sleep deprivation did in fact have a significant effect on human function. Despite these findings, there were still a number of scientists that feel as if sleep deprivation does not have a profound effect on performance but it does seem to have this effect when it comes to a person’s mood.

Another study published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics analyzed the long-term and short-term effects of sleep deprivation. It was found that after one night of skimping out on sleep, people were more likely to become hungrier and eat more (2013). What was found is that when the body fails to get sleep, it becomes more likely to crave high-calorie and high-carb foods. This in turns causes the individual to begin eating unhealthy food, which results in an unhealthy diet (1). One night of sleep deprivation alsoincreased the likelihood of getting in an accident. According to the National Sleep Foundation’s website Drowsydriving.org, you chances of getting into an accident triple when you fail to get at least six hours of sleep (1). The idea of beauty sleep was also supported by this study on short-term effects of sleep deprivation. Not getting enough snooze time resulted in an individual not looking his or her best and therefore made them less approachable. Apparently you begin to appear sadder and less attractive with merely one hour of minimal sleep (1). If these sleep patterns persist for over a month, your chance of having a stroke quadruples (1). According to Laura Schocker, “Research presented at the SLEEP 2012 conference suggested that getting fewer than six hours a night can ratchet up stroke risk for middle-and-older aged people. These people sleeping less than six hours had a four times increased risk of experiencing these stroke symptoms compared to their normal weight counterparts that were getting seven to eight hours.” Stroke was not the only problem that would eventually result in the long run. Your chances of becoming obese also increase dramatically. Considering the things we mentioned about diet in the short term, this path of increased caloric consumption increases the chance of obesity over time. In fact, a study in 2012 by Penn State found that, “sleeping fewer than six hours a night was linked with changes in levels of the appetite hormones gherlinleptin” (1). This hormone regulates your appetite and when it fluctuates in this manner it can make someone want to eat even more when he or she is not hungry. Overall, getting only a few hours of sleep has numerous insidious effects on the body.

Of course there are those who firmly believe that minimal sleep can be a good thing. David Dinges (2011) who is the head of the sleep and chronobiology department at the hospital at the University of Pennsylvania is one of those. Dinges conducted a study that placed subjects in groups of four, five, six, seven, and eight hours of sleep for two weeks. The subjects were tested for their ability to sustain attention using a method called psychomotor vigilance task (PVT). Basically they were asked to press the space bar on a computer as soon as a flash was noticed on the screen. What was found in the study was that there was not a major difference between four hours of sleep and six hours of sleep. In Maggie Jones’ (2011) own words, “Though the four hours subjects performed far worse, the six-hour group also consistently fell off task. By the sixth day, 25 percent of the six-hour group was falling asleep at the computer (1)”. But even in this situation, there was a difference (albeit not major) between those who had 6 hours of sleep and those who had 4. Also, an activity such as pressing a space bar is not nearly as complicated as driving a motor vehicle, or putting together a PowerPoint presentation at an important meeting.

It is obvious that there is no clear formula for the necessary sleep to perform an individual’s daily task. What we do know is that eight hours of sleep is the recommended amount and individuals who do this tend to perform far better in sleep deprivation studies. The evidence shows that falling behind on your sleep schedule can in fact affect you physically and proof of this is shown in dieting patterns after losing out on sleep. There is also evidence that a lack of sleep can affect your mood therefore you are also being affected mentally. In order to perform our best both mentally and physically, we must each find a sleep schedule that fulfills both of these to their full potential but doing so in a way that we are able to fulfill each of our individual schedules.

Reference Page

Huffcut, A., Pilcher, J. (1996). Effect of Sleep Deprivation on Performance: A Meta-Analysis. SLEEP. 318-326.

Jones, M. (May 1, 2011) How Little Sleep Can You Get Away With. The New York Times.

Kolbert, Elizabeth. (March 2013) Up All Night: The science of sleeplessness.The New Yorker.

Sleep Deprivation Could Spur Hormonal Changes Linked With Obesity, Review Finds. (2012). Huffington Post.