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Effects of sleep deprivation essay
Sleep deprivation research essay
Sleep deprivation research paper
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The Effects of Sleep Deprivation
Today, many adults and teenagers in America are suffering from sleep deprivation. Staying up all night is a choice many Americans take, specially teenagers as of whether doing late homework assignments, using electronic devices, or even partying. The question is, can missing so many hours of sleep be that important? Sleep deprivation among all ages can have a big impact on the lives and decision making of many people in America. Doctors reported that many Americans are putting their health and life in risk by not meeting their minimum sleep needed of at least eight hours a day. It all ranges from common problems such as tiredness, to serious health and mental problems.
The effects of sleep deprivation play
Chronic sleep loss is becoming more common in modern culture and less restricted to sleep-deprived diseases such as insomnia. Suggested to be the result of a number car, industrial, medical, and other occupational accidents, sleep deprivation is beginning to be recognized as a public concern. As a result, the Centers for Disease Control
Sleep deprivation is a common condition that occurs if you don’t get enough sleep. In case of sleep deprivation people have trouble falling and staying asleep for a long period of time. In order to understand how serious sleep deprivation can be, one must need to know causes and consequences of sleep deprivation, how much sleep do we need? What does sleep do for us? And how we can cure sleep deprivation.
Sleep deprivation is often associated with the development of medical conditions, especially cardiovascular disease (CVD). As disturbance in sleep could cause deprivation and shorten one’s sleep duration, it is often taken into account when carrying out related studies. Short-term sleep deprivation not only raises blood pressure and produces stress hormones, but also leads to irregular heartbeats [1]. These major risk factors are precursors to coronary disease. In this essay, I will summarize the findings of five studies in relation to sleep deprivation and the increased risk of CVD.
Many times people think they can accomplish more if they could eliminate so much sleeping time. However, they are only hurting their productivity if they lose sleep. Two articles deal with the issue of sleep deprivation. The College Student Journal published an article about the grade-point average of college students and sleep length, while U.S. News & World Report produced an article dealing with the lack of
Sleep is one of our basic needs to survive and to function in day to day operations, but not everyone needs the same amount of sleep. Some people can survive on very little sleep, i.e. five hours a night, and some people need a lot of sleep, to the extend that they are sleeping up to 10 to sometimes 15 hours a night (Nature, 2005). According to Wilson (2005) the general rule states that most people need from seven to eight hours of sleep. The deprivation of sleep in our society in continually increasing with the demands in society increasing work loads, the myth that a few hours of sleep is only necessary to function properly and that sleep is sometimes considered as killing time (Nature, 2005). Sometimes sleep deprivation is also caused by other situations like sleep disorders, i.e. sleep apnea, chronic insomnia or medical conditions such as stress (Wilson, 2005).
Sleeping is something that is an essential part of human nature and is a must in order for one to be a functional human being. Sleep is an idea that is accompanied by many wives’ tales, including the ideas that one needs seven to eight hours of sleep each night and alcohol helps one fall asleep and sleep more soundly. One myth about sleep is that during sleeping, one is in a state of nothingness. In truth, however, it has been discovered that during sleep the brain is active, variations in heartbeat and breathing occur, and the eyes and ears are active throughout the time of sleep. These activities during a person’s sleep are important because they help that person be more aware, awake, and alert during consciousness. If all of these important activities occur during sleep, why is it that people are so willing to short themselves of this vital activity? Although much about sleep still remains a mystery, research and experiments continue to show how important sleep is to each and every person. Throughout this paper, I will discuss sleep and the effects that it has on performance and health, especially in college students. A college student’s sleeping pattern is a reliable indicator to their level of performance in the classroom and other school-affiliated activities, as a lack of sleep leads to decreased performance. Sleep is directly related the level of performance and health in an individual; the more rested a person is, the better that person will perform and feel (Dryer, 2006).
In the world of higher education, students at the collegiate level are highly likely to be overwhelmed with course load, in addition to sports and extra-curricular activities (Jacobs & Dodd, 2003). These factors have the potential to lead to various amounts of sleep deprivation, and as the research of Nilsson, Sunderstrom, Karlsson et al. (2004) has shown, sleep deprivation is correlated with higher levels of fatigue, impairments in speed and accuracy as well as limitations in cognitive and physical performances. One way to cope with this fatigue that has shown to have very positive results on people of all ages is taking naps. In addition to reducing sleepiness, Milner & Cote (2008) have determined that “napping may lead to considerable benefits in terms of mood, alertness and cognitive performances”. It is these benefits that nappers seek when engaging in napping activities.
Carpenter, S. (n.d.). Sleep deprivation may be undermining teen health. http://www.apa.org. Retrieved March 6, 2014, from http://www.apa.org/monitor/oct01/sleepteen.aspx
Have you ever stayed up too late? At one time or another most people have probably experienced that feeling where their eyes start to droop and blur. It’s their body telling them they need to sleep… But do they? Many people might think losing a night’s sleep or not sleeping enough is not a big deal, but in fact, continuously lacking sleep does affect people in a bad way. People should know the healthy amount of sleep they need and some solutions to sleeping problems. Sleep deprivation causes physical and mental effects on the human body and can be directly responsible for many fatal accidents.
Important public policy issues have arisen in our modern 24-hour society, where it is crucial to weigh the value of sleep versus wakefulness. Scientific knowledge about sleep is currently insufficient to resolve the political and academic debates raging about how much and when people should sleep. These issues affect almost everybody, from the shift worker to the international traveler, from the physician to the policy maker, from the anthropologist to the student preparing for an exam.
When sleep isn’t apart of your routine, it begins to affect your knowledge and lack of
Sleep deprivation in teens and young adults has become an epidemic across America. A national poll showed that eighty-seven percent of high school students in America get far less sleep than the recommended eight to ten hours (Richter). Sleep deprivation may be caused by several factors, such as environmental disruptions, emotional distress and physical conditions.
The researchers hypothesized that the participants who had a higher level of sleep deprivation would have lower academic performance, measured in GPA, than those who practice adequate sleep habits. The survey acquired the “age, gender, GPA, and the number of courses on their transcript that shows dropped, withdrawn, or incomplete” (Gilbert and Weaver, 2010). The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) was utilized and contained a “19 item self-report survey designed to measure sleep quality over the past month” (Gilbert and Weaver, 2010). PSQI involves a subscale scoring system that measures “subjective qualities such as latency, duration, habitual sleep efficiency, disturbance, medication use, and daytime dysfunction as they relate to sleep” (Gilbert and Weaver, 2010). The latter part was added to determine the global sleep quality score (GSQ). The scores for this measuring survey range from 0 to 21, and the higher scores indicate poorer sleep quality and habits (Gilbert and Weaver, 2010).
The effects truly define why sleep deprivation among students is a dangerous pattern that teens fall into upon entering high school. Not getting enough sleep ultimately ends up making it more likely for teenagers to become mentally ill, become overweight, and underperform academically, which are only a part of the main effects namely psychological problems, physical health problems, and a decline in academic
“Lack of sleep should no longer be considered a traditional adolescent rite of passage because it can have serious consequences” (McCann, 2008).