Again the sleep question of how much?
The best answer I have come across about how much sleep we need is from Jim Horne, at Loughborough University’s Sleep Research Centre. He said: “The amount of sleep we require is what we need not to be sleepy in the daytime.”
Scientists are still baffled about why we sleep exactly. Apparently, the amount of energy saved by sleeping for even eight hours is very low – about 50 calories, the same amount of energy in a piece of toast. However, what we do know is sleep plays a significant role in brain development. One thing scientists know is if we don’t sleep we suffer from grumpiness, grogginess, irritability and forgetfulness. After just one night without sleep concentration becomes more difficult and attention span shortens considerably.
A world record is 11 days without sleep by Randy Gardner in 1965. He began hallucinating and was delusional, but could function physically quite well. More people probably go without sleep than we realise and this would explain lots of things!!
Here is a video by “Human Guinea Pigs” showing what happens when deprived of sleep due to parenthood. Some interesting facts attributing lack of sleep to being cause of road rage, similar affects to consuming large amounts of alcohol and onset of hallucinations!
Caz says
Great picture of people sleeping.