A City Tech OpenLab Course Site

Why is sleep essential for living a healthy life?

Sleep is a complex & dynamic process that influences how we function throughout the day. Sleep effects our mood, critical thinking & overall heath. Sleep consist of three stages. Stage 1- A period in which we switch from wakefulness to sleep. Stage 2- A  period before you enter deep sleep your heartbeat, breathing, and eye movements slow. Stage 3- A period of deep sleep in which your heartbeat, breathing & eye movement are at their lowest levels. Rem sleep occurs 90 min after falling asleep. Your eye movement rapidly moves side to side. Your heart rate & blood pressure increase while your breathing becomes irregular. Your muscles are paralyzed & most dreams occur in this state.

How can insomnia affect healthy sleeping behavior?

Can dreams occur in non-Rem sleep?

Insomnia can affect your sleep in multiple ways. Insomnia can fall into two categories Sleep-onset insomnia & Sleep maintenance insomnia. Onset insomnia refers to difficulty sleeping while maintenance insomnia refers to trouble staying asleep. Various factors may influence insomnia such as screen time, noise, light, health & substances that affect sleeping such as caffeine.

Yes a study found that low frequency brain waves occur during both cycles. This area allowed the researchers to predict when a person was dreaming however dreams in Non-Rem sleep are merely impossible to recollect.

Overall this topic was very interesting to me. It allowed me to immerse myself in such a broad topic such as sleeping. I learned the negative effects of an unhealthy sleeping behavior. As well as how a medical condition such as insomnia can affect to what extent your sleeping behavior is impacted.

Citations:

https://www.ninds.nih.gov/Disorders/patient-caregiver-education/understanding-sleep

https://www.sleepfoundation.org/insomnia

https://medicalxpress.com/news/2017-04-non-rem.html

2 Comments

  1. nelson checo

    that is a great question and i totally agree with that i think a lot of people will be asking themselves the same question

  2. Dr. Vivian Papp

    Great topic-especially since insomnia is a growing problem these days. Now you need to think of a research question. For example: “What are the latest discoveries for treating insomnia, and how effective are they?”

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *