My students are accustomed to my nagging them about the importance of getting at least 7 hours of sleep a night, something few do. At the same time, it only seems fair to tell them that our records for sleep deprivation are astonishing. Last May, we covered the saga of Tony Wright’s 266 hours of sleep deprivation (more than 11 days) that were chronicled on the BBC.
A couple of months ago, I received an email from Tony himself asking me to look over his book Left in the Dark [1]. A second edition is due to be published this month. I expected the book to focus on sleep deprivation, but found instead a wide-ranging commentary on human brain evolution, the contrast between the functions of the left and right brain, and the influence of diet on brain development.
I did enjoy the book very much, and respect the effort to tie disparate findings together, as opposed to the stratification that we often find in contemporary science. On occasion, I found myself saying, “yes, but….,” and felt like it would be great to have this as a blog on which you could make comments. For example, the section on handedness by Tony and his coauthor, Graham Gynn, seems to imply that handedness is not an advantage that could respond to evolutionary selection pressure. I think we could mount a counterargument here. One of the more intriguing handedness papers to cross my desk suggests that handedness has an advantage in warfare. Men are twice as likely as women to be left-handed, and the proportion of left-handedness increases in cultures experiencing sustained war [2].
I am also a bit more conservative than Tony and Graham about the significance of hemisphere dominance. Perhaps I have been heavily influenced by the words of Roger Sperry, one of the initial investigators of the split brain patients, who said “The left-right dichotomy in cognitive mode is an idea with which it is very easy to run wild” [3].
I thoroughly enjoyed the descriptions of the right-left hemisphere contributions to savant behavior, which we discussed last month. I am also fascinated by the impact of nutrition on brain development, although I’m not convinced that vegetarianism is necessarily the way to go. Instead, we have interesting data that suggest a shoreline diet including seafood and bird eggs may have provided the necessary building blocks for brain growth in humans. Even today, mood disorders are apparently more prevalent in societies that eat little fish [4].
So, Tony and Graham, good luck with your 2nd edition–we’ll look forward to reading that, too. (And hopefully, with that done, you can get some sleep.)
1. Gynn, G., & Wright, T. (2007). Left in the dark. UK: lulu.com.
2. Faurie, C., & Raymond, M. (2004). Handedness frequency over more than ten thousand years. Proceedings: Biological Sciences/The Royal Society, 271 (Suppl. 3), S43-45.
3. Sperry, R.W. (1982). Some effects of disconnecting the cerebral hemispheres. Science, 217, 1223-1226.
4. Noaghiul, S., & Hibbeln, J.R. (2003). Cross-national comparisons of seafood consumption and rates of bipolar disorders. American Journal of Psychiatry, 160(12), 2222-2227.
13 Comments
Vix · February 19, 2008 at 8:22 pm
I have no problems with sleeping at all. I either stay up very late or wake up very early, but that’s okay. Since privacy is very important to me, it gives me more time to do the things I enjoy doing, such as reading or playing video games.
But nice blog post. It was interesting to read, as well.
love2run · February 19, 2008 at 9:39 pm
I feel like we as students are given so much pressure and give ourself so much pressure that it is very challenging to find that happy medium with sleep–we either do too much or too little, both of which leave us feeling guilty, unproductive, and unbalanced. But as a society, the expectations that are placed on students these days are getting a bit out of control..a few of which you touched on in your blog, which is nutrition being a big one that I personally can say affects sleep patterns and can lead to sleep deprivation. I don’t feel like we are properly taught as little people how to stay in balance with our sleep and how vital it is from birth to old age. I feel like we should do a better job of educating the minds of children and try to implement the value of sleep so it will take us into healthy old age.
bldrysdale · February 20, 2008 at 9:47 am
I agree with love2run. While I do get plenty of sleep I feel guilty when I get more sleep because the time I slept could have been time I was studying. This article was very interesting. I didn’t know that left-handedness increases during warfare time. It would be interesting to know the advantages to this.
biopsych · February 22, 2008 at 10:06 am
I find it interesting that a lack of fish in one’s diet can contribute to mood disorders. College students especially have problems getting at least seven hours of sleep due to many factors. Living in the dorms or apartments with roommates makes it harder to sleep when everyone is getting up and going to bed at different times. Class schedules are another factor. Student’s schedules vary from day to day which changes their sleeping patterns. Having classes that go until ten at night or start at seven in the morning is not conducive to a good night’s sleep.
stclark · February 22, 2008 at 12:54 pm
I was horrified to hear in class (was it Monday?) that researchers are developing drugs/methods to allow people to stay awake for days without the usual meth-type side effects. I’m sorry but in what situation (ok, other than active combat where you’re getting shot at..) can not sleeping be a good thing? Our society’s pressure to work longer, do more, be more efficient, SLEEP LESS…. is neurotic. I’m sorry, but we’re making ourselves crazy! If human beings were designed to sleep for a given amount of time, then reason demands one to consider that it might be that way for a reason. Should we really seek out a state that is counter to nature?
I’m going to make it my personal mission to never feel guilty about sleeping again. When push comes to shove timewise, I already usually choose to sleep over studying the night before a midterm, and my GPA doesn’t seem to be suffering….
Maybe we ought to choose sleep over work in other situations too….
Laura Freberg · February 24, 2008 at 9:27 am
In my experience, it’s much easier as a young person to cut sleep. In grad school, I probably averaged about 4 hours per night for about 3 or 4 years, and I was generally okay. Now, if I cut back my sleep, I feel sick, so I’m pretty careful about that. There might be a time or two with tough deadlines that I would consider using caffeine to stay awake, but only in an emergency, and certainly not for days on end.
aoneil · February 24, 2008 at 3:57 pm
I found it interesting in class how we talked about the function of sleep as a mechanism to keep us safe; how animals sleep during times of the day when they are least safe from predation. I always wondered why horses only sleep one to two hours a day, standing up.
I also found our discussion of the other theories of the functions of sleep very interesting, and they reminded me just how wonderful sleep is. Unfortunately, college students don’t usually get the required eight hours of sleep due to stress from work and school. It seems there’s always something to be doing, whether it’s preparing for that next midterm, spending time with friends, or working. The quarter system is extremely fast-paced; one day we’re in the first week and the next its finals. For some it’s so fast paced that it’s nearly impossible to complete everything that needs to get done and still get an adequate amount of sleep. We adjust our sleep pattern to accommodate our schedules, not the other way around.
Swedish55 · February 24, 2008 at 9:26 pm
Sleep has always been a topic of interest to me because for as long as I could remember, I had been known to sleep more then anyone I knew. If I have the opportunity, I would sleep 10-11 hours every night, no problem, and yet I never seemed rested. I was kind of obsessed, thinking that the extra sleep was good for me, good for my skin and overall health, that my body NEEDED that much sleep. It wasn’t until two months ago when I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease (gluten/wheat intolerance) in which I learned that my constant fatigue was most likely caused from this disease. Now I am trying to heal and get healthy again, and I am finding that I am okay with a little less sleep then I seemed to require before. I still think about sleep way more then the average person. I, unlike most of my peers I’m sure, would rather get an adequate amount of sleep, then study another three hours into the night. That doesn’t always help my grades, but who knows, maybe overall my long term memory is storing more information, and I am better off overall? I am also interested in sleep so much because my family has a history of what is now being recognized as restless leg syndrome, and based on my “sleep patterns” I may develop it when I get older as well. I’m just hoping there is more research and development for medications to help with it by the time it becomes a serious factor in my life.
kenmorrison · February 27, 2008 at 12:04 pm
I was very interested in the handedness comments of war fare, and I am more curious on how they would be a benefit for war fare. I understand that being a left-handed pitcher is quite an advantage and I know that for any tennis player, playing a left-handed player is very difficult because everything that would be hard for a right-hander to get, a southpaw handles it very easily. Also left-handed tennis players are used to playing against right-handers. Unfortunately, being a left-hander myself, the vast majority of the world is set up for the right-hand; desks is one of the big one’s for students. Also, for golf I had to switch to putting right-handed because I was unable to find a left-handed putter I liked.
bnfowler · March 9, 2008 at 5:06 pm
Sleep (or lack of it) has always been a stressor for me. While I know that I need to sleep I feel that the demands of college students often prevent us from getting the recommended amounts of sleep. Currently I am really sick, from stress and lack of sleep no doubt, and the heavy amount of prescription narcotics I am on knocked me out this weekend. Upon awaking (23 hours after laying down for my “nap”) I was quite frustrated that I had wasted so much valuable time sleeping. It has been so conditioned in us that we need to get a lot of things done everyday, and that sleep is what we do with our left over time, but shouldn’t we be prioritizing time for sleep like we do for things such as studying? I think that sleep needs to be promoted as something good, both physically and cognitively. Instead of trying to come up with new medications to reduce the amount of sleep needed we should be emphasizing it’s benefits (as well as the down side to not sleeping). Posters and teachers constantly remind us Poly students to study 25- 35 hours a week if we want to do well in school, but why doesn’t anyone but our occasional psych or health teacher promote sleeping 49-59 hours per week??
ccallag · March 10, 2008 at 8:23 pm
I can’t stand being sleep deprived because I love sleep soo much. I need at least seven hours of sleep, but my ideal is 9 hours. I have to take a nap during the day if i get 7 or less hours of sleep. My body thrives off enough rest. Yet some of my friends can sleep for 5 hours and be completely fine. I don’t know how they do it! Or even the people who stay up all night to study for an exam. My brain stops working after about 10 pm. It’s interesting to see how different people need different amounts of sleep and how some can function on so little. It makes me wonder what the long term effects of little sleep..not good i am sure.
trubio · March 13, 2008 at 7:38 pm
I have a stressful job and high energy schedule, so I find sleep to be even more necessary now than when I was going to school full time. I’m gone usually around 13 or 14 (8 of which are spent with defiant teenagers) hours a day and my minimum sleep requirement is 7 hours. I’d say I’m happiest with about 9 hours of sleep. The biggest thing I see when I deprive my body of sleep is a decline in the function of my immune system. Bottom line, it’s just plain unhealthy to refrain from adequate amounts of sleep. I’m interested in the comment about fish in the diet though… I hate seafood, but I keep hearing all of these random benefits of adding fish into the diet.
reggie · March 14, 2008 at 8:23 pm
I believe sleep is one of the biggest issues for college students. As for me, I always aim for at least 6 hours of sleep during the weekday. And stated by others here, there are many factors that contribute to sleep deprivation that is hard to escape. Sometimes we just want to go out during the weekday or play video games all night, and yet sometimes we don’t realize how much sleep deprivation we take for granted. I once heard in an article that one of the best times to take a nap is in between studying, having at the most one hour. Sometimes I think to myself, is that really enough?
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