The Importance of Getting a Good Night’s Sleep

Getting a good night’s sleep can help prevent illness, reduce stress and improve your mood. Yet many people don’t get enough restful sleep. In fact, getting too little sleep can actually harm your health. That’s because lack of sleep may raise your risk for certain chronic (long-term) conditions. It can also affect how well you think, react, work, learn and get along with others.

For years, scientists have been attempting to figure out exactly what happens during sleep. They’ve found that the brain is active during sleep, but in a way that differs from being awake. Brain activity ramps up and down during the four or five cycles of sleep, a process called rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. Each of these phases plays a different role in the overall function of the brain and body.

All mammals, birds and reptiles sleep in one form or another, as do many other organisms, including plants. Scientists haven’t figured out why these organisms do so, but they have learned a lot about the process of sleep from research on mammals, especially rodents. Scientists have discovered that as the rodents move through the various stages of sleep, their hormone levels change, and they do so in a way that is similar to what human beings experience when they go through the cycle of sleep.

The earliest breakthrough came in 1983, when psychologist David Dinger and his team at the University of Chicago published their study of rats who were continuously deprived of sleep. Their experiment led to the discovery that without sufficient amounts of sleep, rats died within two weeks. This research was the first clear indication that sleep is essential to life and health.

Dinger and his team went on to show that insufficient sleep can cause the same negative effects on brain health as alcohol and drug abuse and certain mental illnesses. In addition, they demonstrated that the risk of heart disease and diabetes is increased when adequate amounts of sleep are not obtained. The team’s findings were reinforced by subsequent studies that showed that a good night’s sleep is among the four traditional lifestyle factors that can best lower one’s risk of cardiovascular disease: physical activity, healthy eating and nonsmoking.

Other studies have shown that sleep deprivation is associated with memory loss and poor performance in school or at work. It also increases the risk of certain psychiatric disorders and may contribute to the severity of some of them. In addition, it is known that a lack of sleep can lead to unhealthy behaviours such as overeating and an increased risk of developing obstructive sleep apnea. It is also linked to poor social interactions and can cause depression and anxiety.