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Sure! It took me a decade as a neuroscientist to realize that sleep is the inverse of stress. That's physiologically speaking - stress is the sympathetic system
by robg 12y ago
Sure! It took me a decade as a neuroscientist to realize that sleep is the inverse of stress. That's physiologically speaking - stress is the sympathetic system; sleep is the parasympathetic system.
We're seeing a type of high stress sleep. We don't know what it means or why. But the aim is to continue to drill in - a kind of citizen science of how sleep and stress interact. What questions would folks what to see answered?
I discovered wearing our watch that naps are stress relieving for me. Others see the same effect during meditation, and I wonder if that too is a form of sleep, physiologically speaking.
EDIT: Since it got buried below, this study will turn out to be a huge inflection point in terms of how sleep is understood and taught. Sleep appears to wash away toxins that collect during the stressful day. Sleep seems to be a form of garbage collection.
http://www.nih.gov/news/health/oct2013/ninds-17.htm http://www.nih.gov/news/health/oct2013/ninds-17.htm
- dang 12y agoWhat do you mean by "we're seeing a type of high stress sleep"? It sounds counterintuitive.
- robg 12y agoI mean that people report (and their activity data suggests) sleeping but that the sympathetic response - "fight-or-flight" - didn't seem to turn down significantly from being awake. The best analogy, I think, is that your body should flip to idle during sleep, but we see that you're still running very hot.
- larrys 12y agoIt would be interesting if you could correlate that to what the person is doing physically during each sleep type. By way of a video device (similar to what is done with that part of a sleep study) that captures and can be played back or analyzed. I was actually going to set this up for a person with sleep apnea but they passed away before I could get the solution cobbled together. To summarize: Get a normal video capture (baby monitor etc.), capture video, analyze and play back video and see the differences..
- robg 12y agoThe accelerometer is actually really helpful. We are naturally paralyzed during deep sleep and REM, so that helps to distinguish those stages. Lighter sleep and being awake is easier as a kind, but less so as a degree.
- TravM 12y agoThis is fascinating, and it makes a lot of sense. Do you have any links to any research regarding this, for those that would like to learn more?
- robg 12y agoWe've been looking but besides the clinical reports of sleep disturbances and night tremors, we're not finding physiological evidence of sympathetic activation. It's where we get excited by doing the research as a community of users.
- wainstead 12y agoI have been a fan of power naps for the past year or so; I work from home so taking 25 minutes to nap in mid-afternoon is not a problem. I just completed the program in "Mindfulness: An Eight-Week Plan" (Williams, Penman) and found in those eight weeks I didn't feel a need to nap in the afternoon. I just didn't get sleep late in the day.
- robg 12y agoOur users who meditate report the same thing. What's really interesting to consider whether like sleep, meditation helps open up the glymphatic system for garbage collection. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glymphatic_system http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glymphatic_system http://www.nbb.cornell.edu/neurobio/Fetcho/NBBjournalclub/warden-paperfull.pdf http://www.nbb.cornell.edu/neurobio/Fetcho/NBBjournalclub/wa...