Is Cutting Back on Sleep a Form of Torture?

How dangerous is sleep deprivation? Is it more harmful to your health, and productivity, than, say, fasting?

I recently read a blog post by Tony Schwartz in the Harvard Business Review in which he suggested that Americans are performing self-torture by not getting to bed early enough each night. Stating in his blog that Amnesty International calls sleep deprivation a form of torture, worse than fasting for a week, Schwartz goes on to quote former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin from his memoir White Nights about being sleep deprived in a KGB prison:

"In the head of the interrogated prisoner a haze begins to form. His spirit is wearied to death, his legs are unsteady, and he has one sole desire: to sleep ... Anyone who has experienced this desire knows that not even hunger and thirst are comparable with it."

But is eking out those extra hours of work the best thing for your productivity and your job? The research yells a resounding no:

• Studies have shown that we have a delayed response time when we cut back on sleep from 8 to 6 hours for a few nights in a row.
• One study found that participants who were allowed to sleep for only 6 hours per night for 12 nights had response times as poor as those who stayed up all night for one night.
• One study found that inadequate sleep decreased short-term memory and was associated with poor performance on newly learned or complex tasks as well as difficulty maintaining attention.

Typically, they sleep significantly more than the rest of us. In Anders Ericcson's famous study of violinists, the top performers slept an average of 8 ½ hours out of every 24, including a 20 to 30 minute midafternoon nap some 2 hours a day more than the average American.

• Our perception of how sleepy we are starts to level off after a few days, i.e., we develop some tolerance to feelings of sleepiness, which may make us unaware of our deteriorating alertness and performance.
• And the kicker: Compared with those who sleep for 7 to 8 hours, shorter sleepers (usually substantially less than 7 hours) have an increased risk of dying.

• You're not getting at least 7 hours of sleep (some of us need 8, but very few of us need less than 7).
• You need coffee to wake up or get going each morning.
• You have difficulty remaining focused and productive when sitting for a while.
• You may feel blue or irritable.
• Your memory may not be as sharp as it should be (you've blamed it on age, but it may be sleep deprivation).

1. Stop working two hours before going to bed.
2. Turn off electronics about an hour before bed so that you can unwind (this includes the TV).
3. Follow the advice I included in my last post on sleep.