10 facts about sleep that you were probably too tired to think about…

1)  In our life, we will spend in average 1/3 of our time sleeping which means about 20 to 25 years over 75
2)  Parents could lose 400 to 750 hours of sleep in the first year of their new baby.

3) 17 hours without any sleep leads to a decrease in performance equivalent to a blood alcohol-level of 0.05%

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4)  It is suggested by some studies that women need up to an hour's extra sleep a night compared to men, and not getting it may be one reason why women are much more susceptible to depression than men.

5)  “The 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill off Alaska, the Challenger space shuttle disaster and the Chernobyl nuclear accident have all been attributed to human errors in which sleep-deprivation played a role”.

6)  “To drop off we must cool off; body temperature and the brain's sleep-wake cycle are closely linked. That's why hot summer nights can cause a restless sleep. The blood flow mechanism that transfers core body heat to the skin works best between 18 and 30 degrees. But later in life, the comfort zone shrinks to between 23 and 25 degrees - one reason why older people have more sleep disorders”.

7) Our "natural alarm clock" which enables us to wake up more or less when we want to is due to a burst of the stress hormone adrenocorticotropin. Some research claims that this is a reflect of an unconscious anticipation of the stress of waking up.

 8)  “The extra-hour of sleep received when clocks are put back at the start of daylight in Canada has been found to coincide with a fall in the number of road accidents”.

9)  “The NRMA (National Roads and Motorists' Association in Australia) estimates fatigue is involved in one in 6 fatal road accidents”.

10)  “One of the best predictors of insomnia later in life is the development of bad habits from having sleep disturbed by young children”.

It is an extract of the 40 amazing facts discovered by an Australian national project on sleep research called: 40 facts about sleep you probably didn’t know…”

DID YOU KNOW THAT? WHAT DO YOU THINK?

Source: http://www.abc.net.au/science/sleep/facts.htm