Is 6 Hours Of Sleep Enough?

 If you think you are sleeping seven hours per night, like 1 in 3 Americans, there is every chance that you are getting just six. Based on the results of a single study, one could argue that even if you think you are getting 6 hours a night, chances are you are getting just 5, much lower than the recommended average. For adults, getting fewer than seven hours of sleep a night regularly has been linked with bad health, including weight gain, having a BMI of 30 or higher, diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke, and depression. One recent study found that sleeping more than 6.5 hours was associated with decreased cognitive performance over time -- that is low, considering older adults are recommended to get seven to eight hours of sleep each night.

 

Overall, researchers found that sleeping less than 4.5 hours and sleeping longer than 6.5 hours per night - along with a lower quality of sleep - was associated with cognitive decline over time. The 6 hours-of-sleep group performed well up to the 10th day in a notable study, at which point its cognitive performance declined, becoming just as poor as that of another group. In the final days of a single study, subjects that were restricted to only a maximum of 6 hours of sleep a night showed cognitive performance as poor as the unlucky subset.

 

One study took 48 adults and restricted them to sleep a maximum of four, six, or eight hours a night over a period of two weeks; one unlucky subset was deprived of sleep for three days in a row. Subjects in the laboratory-based sleep study, allowed only six hours of sleep per night for two weeks at a time, performed just as poorly as subjects forced to remain awake for two days at a time. Why Six Hours of Sleep Is Not Enough As you might guess, subjects allowed to sleep eight hours per night had better average performances.

 

Once you are an adult, getting a proper amount of sleep means getting seven to 10 hours a night. If you get a consistent eight hours of sleep, your body is seamlessly capable of maintaining its normal appetite and hunger patterns. If you are recording adequate hours of sleep, you will feel energy and alert throughout the day, from the time you wake up to the time you normally go to sleep. By working on any sleep issues you have, and making the time each night that you need for the necessary amount of sleep, you will increase your energy, productivity, and general well-being.

 

Since sleep is so important to many aspects of good health, you should make getting the proper amount every night a top priority. Unless you are some magic sleeping mutant, you have to get adequate sleep, otherwise your body, health, and general quality of life can take a hit. While we all know somebody who gets away with getting less sleep, the risks associated with not getting enough sleep, like decreased cognitive function and weight gain, are enough of a reason to make sure that you are getting plenty of it for yourself.

 

One bad nights sleep might not seem devastating over the long term, but the consequences of cumulative sleep deprivation may creep up on you once you are used to getting fewer than six hours. Even if you wake up feeling you got a good nights rest from only getting 6 hours, it is very possible you are unaware of the negative effects of sleeping so little, since you are used to it. Some people get eight to nine hours a night, but do not feel as refreshed upon waking up because their sleep quality is not good. After three to four hours, people frequently wake up and cannot fall back asleep.

 

Well, they are neglecting their sleep, staying awake till wee hours of the night. Research has shown that while some may report feeling better rested after sleeping 6 hours, they are sleep-deprived beyond what they know. Sleeping only 7 hours over 10 nights straight makes your brain just as impaired as if you had gone to bed the previous evening, although you might not feel it as soon as you wake up.

 

Other times, you can sleep as much as 10 hours and still wake up tired and groggy. For someone who has not had a consistent sleep schedule in the past, a seven-to-nine-hour nap may feel impossible. While stimulants such as alcohol can keep you awake, your quality of sleep will be compromised because of it. While substances such as alcohol can induce the sense of being drowsy, your sleep will actually be extremely disturbed.

 

If you consume caffeine, alcohol, or even take sleeping pills on a regular basis, it can be difficult to fall asleep and stay asleep. If you have trouble getting out of bed in the morning, or if you are struggling with concentration, productivity, over-stress, emotional crashes, or fatigue during the day, it is likely that you are not getting enough sleep.

 

Worse, getting a bad nights sleep, or too little, may increase the chances that you will develop chronic diseases such as diabetes, obesity, and heart disease (10, 11, 12, 13). If you are sleeping for six hours or less each night and experiencing these symptoms, then you need to either increase how much sleep you are getting to reflect nightly recommendations for your age, or find ways to improve the quality of sleep. While improving overall sleep will improve your REM sleep, you may also want to look into sleeping for another 30 minutes to an hour more in the morning, when your REM sleep stages are longer.

 

The same study also estimates that, for each extra hour people get of sleep past six, they are overestimating their sleep for around a half-hour. Another study on sleep published in the journal Epidemiology indicates that people overestimate their nights sleep overall by around 0.8 hours. In a global sample of more than 10,000 people, researchers concluded that, from the perspective of brain function, getting fewer than 4 hours of sleep is equivalent to adding eight years to your life.