Sleep Patterns Essay

Sleep is an essential of basic human functioning. Sufficient sleep duration is necessary for the best possible performance. There are three types of sleeping patterns. “Monophasic is sleeping once for more than 6 hours every 24 hours, biphasic (sleeping twice every 24 hours) and polyphasic (taking multiple naps per day)” (Saeed, 2015). These varieties in sleep patterns can affect memory, affecting students in their studies. The purpose of the study was to see what sleep pattern of students produced the most passing grades. To test the relationships between sleep patterns and academic performance Dr.Zeba Saeed surveyed 347 medical students to see which student’s sleep pattern performed the best academically. Students with biphasic sleep habits

The Importance of Sleep “Sleep is a state of physical inactivity and mental rest in which conscious awareness, thought, and voluntary movement cease and intermittent dreaming takes place” (Thompson, 2015). Sleeping is an important part of everyone’s day. Many health issues can be solved by sleeping more. Colleges seem to be designed for sleep deprivation. Demanding classes, social issues and work are all competing for a college student’s time. Universities are filled with college kids sleeping on couches and other various places around campus. It has become such a large issue that the many schools are giving “nap lessons” (Pope 2012). It affects our stress levels and motivation (Saeed 2015). There are four stages of sleep,followed by REM, or rapid eye movement sleep (What is Sleep?,2007). Stage one sleep is very light and can be easily disrupted. Stage two sleep, eye movement stops and brain waves become slower.Stage three produces very slow brain waves, called delta waves.

These students were also the most likely get an adequate amount of hours of sleep in a day (Saeeed,2015). “Biphasic sleep matches the body’s instinctive circadian rhythm, hormonal regulation and memory creation” (Saeed 2015). However, biphasic sleepers were more likely to oversleep than monophasic students. Polyphasic students have to wake up more frequently than monophasic and biphasic sleepers. This gives them more opportunities to oversleep, which may be why the percentage is so much higher.Saeed never predicted one group would outperform the other, but wanted to study the relationship between sleep patterns and academic performance. Polyphasic sleepers got the least amount of REM sleep, which is important for memory formation. REM sleep comes after Stage three of sleep. “REM sleeps mediates the prioritized processing of emotional memories within the hippocampus” (Hutchinson and Rathore, 2015). Rapid Eye Movement sleep is the most important, deepest part of sleep (Thompson, 2014). “ Body tissues heal and regenerate during non-REM sleep and brain tissue heals during REM sleep” (Thompson, 2016). There are many other factors that affect sleep. Some participants may be more physically active, while others spend any free time on the computer or at social gatherings. College student are not the only group who are feel the effects of a demanding schedule. Night shift