Welcome to the first Who-Knew Wednesday of 2018!
Today, we’re celebrating the Festival of sleep!
The Festival of Sleep day was founded by someone who had a profound and deep love of sleep. Sleep is a basic human function, and helps our bodies to regain energy for the next day, keeping our mind alert and ready for action. During the holidays, things can get crazy, so this holiday was created to let you catch up on those post-holiday Z’s.
Having a lack of sleep can be fatal to the human body and mind, effects caused by little to no sleep over an extended period of time are as follows.
Effect One: Lack of sleep in the modern world can cause people to get into vehicular accidents, which happen daily in large numbers.
Effect Two: Lack of sleep can in fact, dumb you down. As we all know, sleep plays a critical role in our thinking and learning processes. We also know that a lack of sleep hurts these cognitive processes in many ways. First, it impairs attention, alertness, concentration, reasoning, and problem solving. This makes it more difficult to learn efficiently. Secondly, sleep helps to retain memories of the day’s experience. Meaning that with a lack of sleep, we would not remember much of the previous day’s experiences. This makes sleep incredibly important for students, from those in college to those simply trying to learn a new language on their own.
Effect Three: Probably the most dangerous effect from having a long term lack of sleep is it can cause many and deadly health problems. Here are some examples of these problems.
• Heart Disease
• Heart Attack
• Heart Failure
• Irregular Heartbeat
• High Blood Pressure
• Stroke
• Diabetes
Here are some more fun facts about sleep!
- In general, most healthy adults need seven to nine hours of sleep a night. However, some individuals are able to function without sleepiness or drowsiness after as little as six hours of sleep. Others can’t perform at their peak unless they’ve slept ten hours.
- We naturally feel tired at two different times of the day: about 2:00 AM and 2:00 PM. It is this natural dip in alertness that is primarily responsible for the post-lunch dip.
- Sleep is just as important as diet and exercise.
- The higher the altitude, the greater the sleep disruption. Generally, sleep disturbance becomes greater at altitudes of 13,200 feet or more. The disturbance is thought to be caused by diminished oxygen levels and accompanying changes in respiration. Most people adjust to new altitudes in approximately two to three weeks.
- In general, exercising regularly makes it easier to fall asleep and contributes to sounder sleep. However, exercising sporadically or right before going to bed will make falling asleep more difficult.
- Snoring is the primary cause of sleep disruption for approximately 90 million American adults; 37 million on a regular basis.
- Scientists still don’t know — and probably never will — if animals dream during REM sleep, as humans do.
- People who don’t get enough sleep are more likely to have bigger appetites due to the fact that their leptin levels (leptin is an appetite-regulating hormone) fall, promoting appetite increase.
Thanks for listening!
-Lilly
Driving Notes 