Still Resisting A Rest?
I still see articles demonizing naps written by very misguided people. Let me tell you something: millennia of human experience, plus solid modern science tells us it is good to snooze in the afternoon!!!!!
References
If You Love An Afternoon Nap, We’ve Got News For You
Habiba Katsha. HuffPost UK, June 24, 2023
There’s nothing quite like taking a nap mid-afternoon. Yes, sleeping at night is
great, but getting 30 minutes of shut-eye in the day is even better.
And that cheeky half an hour on the sofa could also be working wonders for your
brain health, new research has found. In fact, having a quick nap in the
afternoon could slow the rate your brain shrinks as you age, according to a study
led by researchers at University College London (UCL) and the University of the
Republic in Uruguay. The researchers involved in the study want the findings to
reduce the stigma associated with daytime napping for adults. They said the
average difference in brain volume between serial nappers and those who do not
nap was parallel to 2.6 to 6.5 years of ageing. “Our findings suggest that, for
some people, short daytime naps may be a part of the puzzle that could help
preserve the health of the brain as we get older,” said senior author Dr Victoria
Garfield, of the MRC Unit for Lifelong Health & Ageing at UCL. The study, which
was published in the journal Sleep Health, examined adults aged 40 to 69.
Researchers analyzed 97 tiny parts of DNA believed to control people’s
probability of being serial nappers. They compared measures of brain health of
people more genetically programmed to nap, with people who did not have these
changes in DNA. Data from 378,932 people from the UK Biobank study was
used. The study found that those who were predetermined to snooze in the
afternoon had a larger total brain volume.
Daytime sleepiness in women linked to worse memory
Healio Minute, June 26, 2023
Greater daytime sleepiness scores were associated with worse sleep-dependent memory consolidation in women, Kimberly Espejo said in a presentation at SLEEP 2023. “Sleep disruption may be a preventable cause of memory impairment,” Espejo, a clinical research coordinator at UC San Diego Health, said. She and her colleagues “looked at the association between daytime sleepiness and sleep-dependent memory consolidation by sex in cognitively older adults,” and hypothesized that they would see sex differences in the results. According to Espejo, 32 adults with a mean age of 70.7 years were evaluated, 75% of whom were non-Hispanic white and 50% of whom were women. “As part of a larger study, they were screened with the Montreal Cognitive Assessment,” she said. “Eligible participants came back for an overnight visit and were assessed for obstructive sleep apnea and completed the Word-Pairs Association (WPA) task to assess sleep-dependent memory consolidation. It was examined by calculated change in morning vs. evening WPA score.” Espejo explained that in the evening, participants were shown 40-word pairs on a computer. Some were related; some were not. Immediately afterward, participants were presented with the first word of the pair and given 10 seconds to respond with the matching word pair. They were given up to three tries. The next morning, the test was repeated.
“Independent t-tests revealed that women scored significantly lower on the Epworth Sleepiness Scale and scored better on WPA than men,” Espejo said, “meaning that they had less daytime sleepiness and did better on the WPA. But in women, a better WPA was associated with less daytime sleepiness.”
She continued: “Preliminary findings from this ongoing study provide support for a sex-specific association between daytime sleepiness and sleep-dependent memory consolidation. Further research is needed on this topic to determine if there are optimal preventive strategies for older adults, specifically women, at risk of cognitive decline.”
