What Is Sleep Deprivation?

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While loss of sleep must be required at times, Sleep deprivation has become one problem worth addressing because it is a very common sleep disorder which can adversely affect the brain and cognitive function. It has many effects on a human brain such as depression, memory lapses or loss, symptoms similar to ADHD, and many more. In order to identify what sleep deprivation is, it is necessary to understand what sleep does for the human brain and body.
Sleep is the most important part of ones health. Sleep is defined as: a period of rest for the body and mind, during which volition and consciousness are in abeyance and bodily functions are partially suspended; also described as a behavioral state, with characteristic immobile posture and diminished …show more content…

The body has circadian rhythm which is when the biological clock: regular bodily rhythms that occur on a 24-hour cycle such as temperature and wakefulness. The biological clock that is the light striking the retina, signals the suprachiasmatic nucleus which suppress the pineal gland’s production of the sleep hormone melatonin. At night, the SCN quiets down, allowing the pineal gland to releases melatonin into the bloodstream (Myers, 2009). Today people stay up too late and the body is accustomed to a 24-hour day. Young adults now have adopted to a 25-hour day which this then affects the amount of sleep we get by reducing our sleep. Humans have a sleep cycle that has five sleep stages. All the stages are completed in about 90 minutes. In state 1: sleep, our body is leaving the alpha waves of the awake, relaxed stage, we descend into transition of often with the sensation of falling or floating. In stage two: sleep, it follows about 20 minutes later with its characteristic sleep spindles. Which in this stage we spend most of our time on. Next, stage three and stage four, together last about 30 minutes with large slow delta waves. In our final stage, also known as the adoxical sleep that is when dreaming mostly occurs. During a normal night sleep, periods of stages 3 and 4 sleep shorten and REM sleep lengthens (Myers, 2009). Sleep disorders affect a lot of the sleep time the body gets. There are many sleep disorders but the major ones are

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