Sleep is very important as we all know but a Minority group of people in the world gets enough sleep or the amount of sleep to be able to work to the full potential.
Most people only think that it’s just the sleep quantity that matters but there are a whole lot of things which is directly related to sleep from our physical to psychological functions. A WHOLE LOT.
So today I will only talk about the effect or importance of sleep on our cognitive performance with the help of a study.
But What Does Cognitive Performance Even Mean?
According to the dictionary, Cognitive Performance refers to the performance of the mental processes of perception, learning, memory, understanding, awareness, reasoning, judgment, intuition, and language.
In short, the rate of ALERTNESS, PRODUCTIVITY, and OVERALL MENTAL HEALTH your brain maintains.
What was the study?
This study measured cognitive performance only based on SLEEP DURATION. Yes, sleep duration is the major factor from which we can conclude things but there are several other important factors also who take part in this like, SLEEP QUALITY AND SLEEP HYGIENE.
This study investigated cognitive performance for different lengths of sleep.
- 3 hours in bed
- 5 hours in bed
- 7 hours in bed
- 9 hours in bed.
Participants completed cognitive performance tests every day.
More Sleep Leads To Better Performance!
It was found that 3 hours in bed (2.87 h of sleep) resulted in the lowest cognitive performance. AS EXPECTED.
This was followed by 5 hours in bed (4.66 h sleep) and then the 7 hours of treatment (6.28 h sleep).
| In Bed | Actual Sleep | Performance | Performance (After 4 days) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3 Hours | 2.87 Hours | Lowest Cognitive Performance | Not able to do anything properly |
| 5 Hours | 4.66 Hours | Sub-optimal | Performance went down |
| 7 Hours | 6.28 Hours | Performance Bit Declined | Sub-optimal |
| 9 hours | 7.93 Hours | Highest Cognitive Performance | Maintained |
The 9 hours in bed (7.93 h of sleep) showed no decline in cognitive performance.
But in the 3 hours of bed treatment, cognitive performance continued to decline daily. In contrast, cognitive performance appeared to stabilize in the 5 and 7 h treatments at a reduced capacity.
Me Who Sleeps 12 Hours A Day
In my opinion, during this period (COVID time) majority of people are lying in bed only.
Yes, as I mentioned above sleep is very important and performs several important functions as well and you should spend a decent amount of time in bed sleeping.
But not doing your work all day and lying on the bed only using your phone is also not good, even worse than not sleeping enough. In long run, our attention spans will decrease, will not be able to focus and we will suffer from lots of degenerative diseases and physical disabilities.
Our bodies are not made that way to spend time in bed only. So my recommendation is that you should consider some time, at least 1 hour a day walking or involved in any physical activity like sports, gym, cycling etc.
REFERENCE: Gregory Belenky et al. J Sleep Res. 2003 Mar. Patterns of performance degradation and restoration during sleep restriction and subsequent recovery: a sleep dose-response study [PubMed]
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