THINK snoozers are losers? Then why not join the world of the sleep hackers, people who have ditched full nights of shut-eye in favour of microsleeps.
was 19 and worried about fitting in all her college work when she attempted the Uberman sleep schedule (see graphic). For the next 6 months, Staver never slept for more than 20 minutes at a time, napping every 4 hours, totalling just 2 hours sleep a day. It鈥檚 one of a number of sleep schedules that promise to maximise our waking hours. But can messing with sleep to such an extreme be a good idea?
Sleep 鈥� a user鈥檚 guide: We answer all the questions keeping you up at night
According to historian of Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, breaking sleep into more than one bout is entirely natural. Pre-industrial civilisations around the world are known to have naturally segmented their sleep into two distinct phases, with an hour or two of 鈥渜uiet wakefulness鈥� in the middle of the night, he says. We鈥檝e done away with this practice, but by this logic, people who experience middle-of-the-night insomnia simply have the natural urge to wake.
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That idea was challenged last year when at the University of California, Los Angeles, investigated how humans might have slept in the pre-industrial era. His team visited three tribes of hunter-gatherers in the African and South American tropics. Much like the rest of us, these peoples preferred to stay up at least another 3 hours after sunset 鈥� and they . 鈥淚鈥檓 not saying that biphasic sleep doesn鈥檛 happen, but it鈥檚 not a 鈥榥atural鈥� form of sleep,鈥� says Siegel.
What about more extreme sleep schedules? After about a week of deeply unpleasant adjustment, which included headaches, chills, tremors and anxiety, Staver said her energy returned, and after a month she felt normal. She wasn鈥檛 even tired between her naps (read more on her story at ). One big perk was gaining 5 hours a day.
Even so, we know a full night鈥檚 sleep allows our brain to cycle several times through a number of phases, each with their own restorative properties. We might be able to cheat time, but what about these health benefits?
鈥淔ragmenting sleep across the night has been demonstrated to be as deleterious as total sleep deprivation for some health outcomes, such as metabolism as well as emotions and moods,鈥� says at the University of California, Berkeley. We know, for instance, that shift workers and others who sleep outside of their normal light-dark circadian rhythms are at a high risk of numerous diseases.
鈥淭his body clock does not offer a lifestyle choice; it is a biological reality, and departing from it can and does have very serious health consequences,鈥� says at the University of Oxford. And people who regularly don鈥檛 get enough sleep die younger. So for the extra hours you save, you might end up losing years from the end of your life.
Besides, if Staver鈥檚 Uberman experience was anything to go by, those extra hours might not be all they鈥檙e cracked up to be. 鈥淚 started off with a huge to-do list, but it went away in days. So I scrubbed my baseboards with a toothbrush, reorganised and darned all my socks.鈥� With that in mind, you might be better off asleep after all.
This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淐an I cheat by sleeping in bits?鈥�
