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The health benefits of sleep for physical and mental health are so great that he suggests, not entirely frivolously, that the question should be not why do we sleep, but why do we wake up? We need NREM (non-rapid eye movement) sleep to file away everything we’ve learnt during the day, to process it and move it from short-term to long-term memory. This is why cramming the night before an exam won’t work, because it’s sleep that allows you to properly integrate and retain what you’ve learnt.
I found what he said about REM sleep (where we dream) most interesting. This is where we make odd connections, have creative thoughts, gain a fresh perspective. Anyone involved in any kind of artistic project will know that feeling. You hit what seems like an insoluble problem, you go to bed and wake up the next morning with a solution that is not just feasible but feels inevitable. This applies as much in daily life – we talk about ‘sleeping on’ a decision all the time.
He’s a big fan of siestas (as am I) and talks about the genesis of the term ‘power nap’ which came from research on the optimum time for airline pilots to rest. It was found that a short sleep at the beginning of a long period of sleep deprivation (eg during a long-haul flight) was the most effective. The FAA decided to institute this as policy but rejected the suggested terms ‘prophylactic napping’ or ‘planned napping’ (the second was considered too managerial, the first, well you can guess). The trouble with the term ‘power napping’ is that it is now colloquially used to suggest a macho alternative to sleep, rather than a short-term expedient when a full-night’s sleep isn’t possible.
The book covers the body clock and circadian rhythms and even sleep in other species. The author also shares exhaustive evidence on the dangers of sleep deprivation, both immediate – such as driving while tired – and long-term, through poor health outcomes.
My slight qualm about the book is that the author is so evangelical about his position. You are left thinking that all the world’s problems could be solved if only we all got a regular eight hours sleep. He cites lots of research backing up his case but a general reader has no context. It’s a bit like watching a courtroom drama and being totally convinced by the prosecution’s case but not getting to hear the defence.
If you do have problems sleeping you are likely to be so frightened by this book that it will keep you awake at night. When was this golden age when everybody got their eight hours? How can we make the comparison? Maybe in past centuries people spent more time in bed (what he calls sleep opportunity) but unless you were wealthy you probably shared a room with several family members (and possibly other fauna). How much quality sleep would you have got in a room where a baby was teething or siblings were fighting or mice were scuttling?
The bit I was really excited about getting to was the chapter on insomnia treatments but all the author offered (after much fanfare) was the old cognitive-behavioural chestnut, which among other things insists on no napping (despite his earlier waxing lyrical on the benefits) and, more seriously, no reading in bed.
There’s a lot in Why We Sleep and overall I found it an interesting and informative read, albeit one without a miracle cure at the end of it.
*
I received a copy of Why We Sleep from the publisher via Netgalley.
A longer version of this review first appeared on my blog katevane.com/blog
Routinely sleeping less than six or seven hours a night demolishes your immune system, more than
And this is supposed to help me sleep better!? At least before, I just used to lie there going over the same three lines from ‘I Just Can't Wait to be King’; now, if I so much as drift into momentary consciousness at two a.m., I end up paralysed with alertness, calculating the gradually rising odds that my obese, cancer-ridden body will only cease to be a concern thanks to the merciful onset of my crippling dementia.
Eventually Walker just comes right out and admits that as far as the science is concerned, ‘wakefulness is low-level brain damage’, at which point you start to wonder how far he's really going to take this whole unconsciousness thing. But by then the damage is done. Your life is different. Come evening, when Hannah is pouring herself a glass of Sancerre and playing Gaga, I now appear in the doorway in my slippers, with a hot-water bottle clutched under one arm and a toothbrush jutting from my jaws. It may feel antisocial, but anything seems preferable to inviting the heart disease, obesity, cystitis, tennis elbow and plagues of locusts that Walker is otherwise promising.
A while back I got a Fitbit, which allows me to see in appalling detail just how much sleep I sometimes fail to get – the hypnograms, with their discrete stages of slumber, never quite stretching as far as you'd like them to. Thanks to this book, it's now possible to quantify exactly what I'm missing out on during such nights, as scientists have mapped more of the neurochemical processes involved than I ever realised: the deep, NREM sleep where memories are carefully transferred from short-term to long-term memory; then the ‘informational alchemy’ of REM-sleep dreaming, which sharpens creativity and conjures up solutions to our daytime problems.
The importance of sleep can be further appraised by its evolutionary heritage – it goes back about as far as life on earth. Walker finds that even ‘the very simplest form of unicellular organisms that survive for periods exceeding twenty-four hours, such as bacteria, have active and passive phases that correspond to the light-dark cycle of our planet’. Sleep is about the first thing natural selection locked in for us, and as far as we can tell every animal does it.
One always understood that sleep was a healthy thing, but somehow a full night of it is still often viewed as a luxury. On the evidence of this book, it's more like a medical necessity. Given working practices in many parts of the world, this is a big problem, and indeed part of Walker's mission is to explain that much of the developed world is suffering from a serious, chronic sleep deficit which is ultimately ‘a slow form of self-euthanasia’ – he is talking not just to individual sleepers, but to businesses and governments who have some responsibility to take what he says into account.
The difference between a four-star book and a five-star one is that while I might love both of them, I can keep a four-star book to myself, whereas a five-star book is one I can't shut up about to everyone around me. On that basis, despite its occasional infelicities, Why We Sleep makes the grade. It's passionate and clearly written, summarises a huge amount of research about which I knew little, and addresses a subject that obviously deserves the attention. It would take someone a lot more cynical than me to read this and not silently decide to make a few lifestyle changes – on which note, if you'll excuse me, I have some intensive, hi-octane pillow time to get to.
My only 'complaint' was that it didn't address at all the chronic sleep deprivation of parents, especially of mothers with babies. And it didn't discuss at all if there are any differential effects for women vs men. Perhaps there isn't enough evidence to report, but still.
Nonetheless, it was an incredibly instructive (and terrifying!) book. Highly recommended.
Read this book. It's probably the most important non-fiction book I have read in quite a while, and it has changed how I approach sleep.
It is only recently though that scientists have been able to understand through decades of cutting-edge research just how key sleep is to our health and well-being. In essence, sleep is an essential element to our well being and health and in this book, Professor Matthew Walker sets out just how important it is and how most common diseases in the modern western world have roots deep within our lack of sleep. In this he will explain just what the different sleep types are and how they help us think over deeper and long-term issues, the effects of stimulants on our sleep and why do most teenagers drive like they are missing part of their brain? Because they are… It takes deep sleep and developmental time to accomplish the neural maturation that plugs this brain 'gap' in the frontal lobe. There is a fascinating demonstration on how lack of sleep can affect how we perform; he shows that sleep deprivation can have an equivalent effect to alcohol when driving.
Walker recommends that we need around eight hours each night; I normally only have about six hours sleep a night, heading to bed around midnight and being startled into life as the alarm screams at 6.15. Reading this has made me think about the best way to increase that given the potential health benefits of sleep. Did like the fact that a sleep graph is called a hypnogram. Generally, it is very well written too, he takes time to explain in a clear manner the points that he is making but occasionally it drifts towards more academic prose. If you have trouble sleeping or are just fascinated by the way the body works then you should read this.
There are a few places where he gets speculative and there I don't find him as convincing. I also would have liked more information on
But these are small details. It has actually made me decrease my intake of coffee, and I stopped feeling bad about making sure I get the sleep I need. Highly recommended.
Countering my previous beliefs that my parents don't need enough sleep, the book argues people need as much sleep through their life and then clarifies why they are unable to sleep throughout the night.
My son is nearing being an adolescent teenager and I'll be mindful of him wanting sleep late and wake up late; he's already showing symptoms!
Majority of the activities of our daily life start early in the day. This is being indifferent and insensitive to those night-owls and gives an edge to the morning larks. I prefer being a morning lark myself, but the author has taught me to be sympathetic towards people of the 'other' chronotype.
How caffeine masks sleepiness, how alcohol sedates, how flying west is easier on our circadian rhythm than flying east, how insomnia is different from sleep deprivation and finally how you can work towards a full night of sleep and wake up to a refreshing morning are things you'll know reading this book.
--Insomnia is one of the most prevalent and pressing medical conditions in society.
-- If you get behind the wheel of a car and had four hours or less sleep the night before, there is an 11.5 times greater chance you will get involved in a crash.
-- REM-sleep dreaming can take “the difficult sting out of difficult, even traumatic emotional episodes…offering emotional resolution.” REM sleep also recalibrates our brains in ways that allow us to better read the social world around us and improve our memory.
-- Sleep can spur creativity. Walker notes that REM sleep has resulted in “some of the most transformative ideas in history.” Just ask the man who developed the periodic table of elements after being inspired by a dream. Thomas Edison used to take “genius naps ” for this very reason. Paul McCartney plotted the song “Yesterday” while sleeping. The opening riff to the Rolling Stones “Satisfaction” was inspired by a dream.
-- Why early-start times in our schools are making it nearly impossible for many children to effectively learn.
The author ends by presenting some solutions to society’s sleep deprivation epidemic. He suggests workplace changes that emphasize sound sleeping practices, strategies to improve sleeping conditions in hospitals and public awareness campaigns that promote better sleeping practices. He also offers practical tips for promoting sleep health. In conclusion, this is a book that every person should read.
Nature wouldn’t waste an enormous proportion of humans’ (indeed, all
He notes the differing needs, timing and composition of sleep in infants, children, teens, adults and seniors. He describes the hormones/chemicals that promote wakefulness or sleep, including how we hinder their effects, and stresses that alcohol and sleep meds sedate the brain, which is not sleep. Among other physical aspects, sleep regulates immunity (including the destruction of early cancers and mounting an adequate response to immunization) and metabolism (including appetite and cardiovascular health).
But it is the psychological effects that fascinated me. Early in the sleep period (I’ll call it “night”), the sleep cycles are composed predominately of non-REM (NREM) sleep, while later in the night they reverse to predominately REM sleep. NREM sleep serves to move what’s learned/experienced during the day into long-term storage; REM sleep integrates that new material with everything that’s already there; and dreaming (during REM sleep) serves to process emotions and enable creativity (thus truth in the adages to “sleep on it” and that “things will look better in the morning”). A key factor is that the brain does this work each night for the prior waking period, and when it’s impaired by poor sleep or a short sleep, there’s really no make-up opportunity.
Life-changing for me and recommended for everyone.
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"The first sleep book by a leading scientific expert--Professor Matthew Walker, Director of UC Berkeley's Sleep and Neuroimaging Lab--reveals his groundbreaking exploration of sleep, explaining how we can harness its transformative power to change our lives for the better. Sleep is one of the most important but least understood aspects of our life, wellness, and longevity. Until very recently, science had no answer to the question of why we sleep, or what good it served, or why we suffer such devastating health consequences when we don't sleep. Compared to the other basic drives in life--eating, drinking, and reproducing--the purpose of sleep remained elusive. An explosion of scientific discoveries in the last twenty years has shed new light on this fundamental aspect of our lives. Now, preeminent neuroscientist and sleep expert Matthew Walker gives us a new understanding of the vital importance of sleep and dreaming. Within the brain, sleep enriches our ability to learn, memorize, and make logical decisions. It recalibrates our emotions, restocks our immune system, fine-tunes our metabolism, and regulates our appetite. Dreaming mollifies painful memories and creates a virtual reality space in which the brain melds past and present knowledge to inspire creativity. Walker answers important questions about sleep: how do caffeine and alcohol affect sleep? What really happens during REM sleep? Why do our sleep patterns change across a lifetime? How do common sleep aids affect us and can they do long-term damage? Charting cutting-edge scientific breakthroughs, and synthesizing decades of research and clinical practice, Walker explains how we can harness sleep to improve learning, mood, and energy levels; regulate hormones; prevent cancer, Alzheimer's, and diabetes; slow the effects of aging; increase longevity; enhance the education and lifespan of our children, and boost the efficiency, success, and productivity of our businesses. Clear-eyed, fascinating, and accessible, Why We Sleep is a crucial and illuminating book"--… (more)