Fact Sheet
The effects of chronic sleep loss are:
• Delayed reactions
• Easily distracted
• Forgetting known facts
• Difficulty remembering
• Making mistakes and omissions
Sleep loss leads you to be more stressed and irritable. It also leads to a drop in motivation.
The minimum amount of tolerated sleep is six hours. If this is maintained over several weeks your effectiveness slowly decreases. If you wanted to get your body used to just six hours sleep, it would take several weeks for your performance to not be effected. Just remember, even though your performance will not be affected, you will still continue to be drowsy. On the other hand don’t go and increase your sleep by 2-3 hours, as this also decreases performance.
In a sample of 1 million people conducted over six years, the lowest mortality rate was found in people who had on average 6.5 to 7.5 hours sleep a night. Too short or long a sleep has been found to correlate with an increase in diabetes and blood pressure.
A very important thing to note, is that just one night of sleeplessness can cause a 23% increase in mistakes, and a 14% increase in time taken when undertaking menial tasks.
Parents
In teenagers 8-15 who lacked sleep, it has been found they gain more weight than 3-8 year olds who also lacked sleep. The proposed reason for this, is that teenagers go to bed later and wake up later, whereas children go to bed earlier and wake up earlier.
If you are trying to lose weight
Lack of sleep gives adults a 35% risk of gaining five kg and a 27% chance of becoming obese. Having too much sleep also gives adults a 25% risk of gaining five kg and a 21% increased chance of becoming obese.
In healthy humans sleep loss hinders normal functions. The effects maybe different with people who have sleep disorders. Depressive disorders can cause difficulty with sleep. If these problems are eliminated, depression reduces in 40-60% of cases.
For anyone who wants further reading the journal article was called CONSEQUENCES OF SLEEP DEPRIVATION by JOLANTA ORZEŁ-GRYGLEWSKA