Sleep is an important thing. It’s a critical and necessary, but I hate it. I recognize that I’m among a minority when I say this, but it’s true. I’ve always wished I could do without, but I’m an intelligent individual and I’ve always slept as much as I thought was needed. That was before I had kids, though, and now I sleep as much as my kids will let me (read: It matters how many times I have to wake up at night to help with potty breaks, nightmares, sickness, sleeplessness, teething, etc. - all other parents get my drift).
That being said, I still sleep, on average, a lot less than most people I know. I typically go to bed around 11:00 - 11:30 and wake up anywhere between 5:30 and 6:30 depending on meeting schedule, travel, workout plans, and side project/hobby allowance. On that simple math, you’ll see my time asleep is between 6 and 7.5 hours.
Today, a friend who has shown curiosity at my “sleep habits” in the past, shared an article with me that suggested that those who slept 6 hours a night in a sleep study were as cognitively limited as those who were entirely deprived of sleep for two days.
I read the article and wanted to write a quick argument as to why I think the study (as reported by the article) may have been lacking some important details. Fortunately for me (and you if you’re reading and like this) I got a Garmin VivoActiv for Christmas and one of the coolest features - aside from regular alerts that I need to get off my keester during working hours - is the sleep tracking. I used my own sleep data and my personal experiences from the past 20 days and entire life (20 days of sleep data shown above) as a backdrop for my arguments.
1) Nothing in the study (per the article) noted the participants’ sleep history. 6 hours of sleep for some people is a death knell, whereas for others it’s a going average. When there are only 48 participants, adding a even few folks who’ve slept 8+ hours their entire life to the group that is getting 6 will skew the results.
2) Total “in bed” time vs. total “sleeping” time vs. total “lights off trying to sleep” time vs. total “deep sleep” time are all VERY different factors. When I get 4 hours of total deep sleep time, uninterrupted, it’s WAY better than 8 hours of total “lights off trying to sleep but the kids are sick and keep waking up” time peppered with an hour of deep sleep.
3) Who sleeps for the exact same amount of time every night and doesn’t accommodate their body’s need to rest? Is it common for people to actually go to bed and wake up at the exact same time every single day and not take additional time for rest when circumstances allow/necessitate?
4) Perhaps the next study can be a bit longer than 10 days. 10 days is 11% of a business quarter, and less than 3% of a year, so a sleep study that accounts for an inconsequential period of time feels less than conclusive. The body’s ability to adjust to stresses is well documented and while a reduction in sleep from 8 to 6 hours may have deleterious effects over the course of a few days, what happens to overall productivity for an individual if they give themselves 2 more hours of time every day over the course of a lifetime?
5) I’m happy to work at a reduced cognitive level (because even at a reduced level I’m smarter than most people - SARCASM - kinda) if that means in this year alone I’ll have the equivalent of 25+ more days (based on 6:20 avg sleep time) of awake time than the person who sleeps 8 hours a night. That’s almost a full month of vacation! And even if it does make me less intelligent, isn’t ignorance bliss, or something like that?