IN DEFENCE OF A NAP
Why an afternoon snooze is good for you
August 15, 2008
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Jane Van Der Voort
TORONTO STAR
The domain of cats and the idle rich has been breached: Naps have new street cred.
There are indications a midday snooze might solve poor performance caused by long, stressful hours at work and non-stop multi-tasking.
"I close my door, lean back in my chair, put my feet up and for 20 minutes I'm out," says John Peever, 39, an assistant professor in University of Toronto's department of cell and systems biology. He says he started the routine following a 2002 study by colleagues at Harvard University that showed a little shut-eye – just 45 minutes – significantly reduced information overload.
"We're misguided in our lack of naps and, in this, our society is driven by economy and not biology. We've gotten rid of naps even though they're good for us ... but that idea is coming back."
Peever points to MetroNaps, a New York company on the 24th floor of the Empire State Building that offers 20 minutes in a sleep pod, a specially adapted chair, for $14.
"Some companies are starting to realize the benefits to cognitive abilities and how we get those with naps."
He says research last year at the University of Wisconsin indicates that sleep not only aids memory, but appears to weed out irrelevant details and background clutter so we can better focus on what's important.
"We know there's something fundamental that happens, and that a nap is just a part of full sleep. We've hypothesized that there's something about deep sleep that allows the cells in the brain to reorganize," Peever says.
As well, he adds, "there's an intuitive part of it – if it feels good after you nap, then it's good for you."
So good, in fact, that most cultures include a quick daytime snooze. Even our own culture.
"We used to do it here in North America – it's part of the farming culture," Peever says. "I grew up on a farm outside of Peterborough and everyone kind of had a nap after a big lunch.
"We all know about it – think about the picture of the person with their belt buckle undone after a meal, relaxing on the couch with their eyes closed," he says of a nap most often associated with Thanksgiving. "When we have time, we do it."
The future of napping, given current sleeplessness, looks bright.
"If you look at recent literature, there is a global phenomenon that people are getting less sleep than 50 years ago," Peever says. "Research shows that when you're behind the wheel, a night's sleep deprivation impairs you to the same level as being legally drunk.
"Sleep deprivation is that severe," he says. "The sleep deprivation we face, we can mitigate or minimize with naps."
Toronto Star
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