You most likely feel the benefits of a short nap after taking one, but may weren’t quite sure if a daily one is justified.
Well, good news. In fact, it’s great news. You don’t need to feel guilty taking those afternoon “siestas” because it’s highly beneficial for your brain and body.
And that’s according to scientists and sleep experts from not just one, but many controlled studies.
See this article below, originally published at Today.com for more of this good news:
Here’s a way to make up for the lost hour of sleep after switching to daylight saving time — and it’s not an extra large coffee. Take a nap. And if any other motivation is needed: It’s National Napping Day.
Actually, every day should be nap day, according to research.
A 2016 study from the Centre for Sleep Research at the University of South Australia, finds having two separate sleep periods provides “two periods of increased activity, creativity and alertness across the day, rather than having a long wake period where sleepiness builds up across the day and productivity wanes.”
The researchers also noted that having two sleep periods was once the norm at various points in history across the world.
Melinda Jackson, a senior research fellow at Australia’s RMIT University, and Siobhan Banks, a senior research fellow quoted a passage from the 1840 Charles Dickens novel “Barnaby Rudge” where a character refers to his “first sleep” — which presumably came before losing limbs to dangerous factory machinery and inhaling soot — and then taking a second nap.
Jackson and Banks believe the Spaniards are on to something with their traditional siesta, a two- to three-hour lunch break taken at 2 p.m. and typically used for a nap.
Our body clock naturally lends itself to the siesta because of a reduction in alertness in the early afternoon.
They cited a 1990 study by psychiatrist Thomas Wehr that found “bi-phasic sleep,” which is a science-y phrase for two separate four-hour blocks of sleep, is “a natural process with a biological basis.”
To view the full article, visit the original source at Today.com here.
