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Science

Sleep Less, Live Longer 361

Posted by timothy from the if-you're-reading-this dept.
Linuxathome writes: "The Washington Post carried an article describing the results of a study linking the average amount of sleep one gets per night with his/her life span. It appears that those who sleep less than 8 hours a night, live longer (optimum is 7 hours). The study (link to the abstract) was aimed at looking at the mortality rate of those suffering from insomnia. But rather than associating insomnia with increased risk of death, it appears that sleeping more than 8 hours carries a much higher risk."
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Sleep Less, Live Longer More

Sleep Less, Live Longer

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  • that's nice... (Score:3, Funny)

    by doooras ( 543177 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @03:39AM (#3025203)
    Personally, I'd rather sleep longer and live a shorter life.
    • Just because there appears to be a correlation between sleep hours and longevity, even a statistically relevant correlation---one which cannot readily be attributed to chance---does not mean that there is a cause and effect relationship. There is no reason to conclude that sleeping less will prolong one's life, because it's not clear that sleeping longer shortens it. Assuming that the finding is valid, it's possible, and IMHO more likely, that there is some common cause which gives rise to sleeping more and living less, and merely sleeping less won't eradicate that cause. We can probably rule out the third possibility that longevity causes less sleep, however. :) :)

      • We can probably rule out the third possibility that longevity causes less sleep, however.

        No we can't. The older you are, the less sleep you need (on average). The older you are - the higher your life expectancy (measured from birth) is. If you are already 50 years old, you can't be someone who has died before 50. The life expectancy of someone who is 50 is higher than that of someone who is 20. Did the study's authors bother to correct for age? If not, then the above would be a serious confounding factor.

  • I think I speak for all of us... (Score:4, Funny)

    by marsvin ( 84268 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @03:39AM (#3025205)
    ...when I say that most of us are not often in danger of getting too much sleep ;-)
    • It's funny how studies can be found that support just about *any* hypothesis, including hypotheses that directly oppose each other.

      Less sleep makes you live longer. More sleep makes you live longer.

      Cabbage prevents cancer. Cabbage causes cancer.

      Alcohol is good for your body. Alcohol is bad for your body.

      Marijuana kills brain cells. Marijuana doesn't kill brain cells.

      Why don't we just give up on the whole idea of science and agree with nothing really does anything, and that these studies are just generating a lot of random data for the sake of creating interesting newspaper articles?

  • I'm going to live FOREVER!

  • post & propter and all that .... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by roffe ( 26714 ) <roffe@extern.uio.no> on Monday February 18, 2002 @03:41AM (#3025215) Homepage
    it seems from the report that the data are based on actual sleeping habits. this is to say that the time spent sleeping is, if anything, a symptom, not a cause. lots of rich people fly to Paris every day. this does not mean that flying to Paris every day will make you any richer.
    • this does not mean that flying to Paris every day will make you any richer.

      DAMN IT!

      DAMN IT! DAMN IT! DAMN IT! And I thought I was just about to strike it big....

      Oh well, I guess that means I should call off my IPO.

    • My Take (Score:5, Insightful)

      by KurdtX ( 207196 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @05:12AM (#3025487)
      I agree completely with roffe.

      Think about it, who do you know that sleeps 8+ hours a day, other than the elderly and sick (both groups who at more likely to die than the average person)? And from my experience, the "average person" generally has more important things to do than spend 8+ hours a day sleeping. So as roffe said, sleeping 8+ hours a day is more likely a symptom of someone trying to maintain their health, because they are in danger of dying.

      To put it another way, when I had mono I was sleeping 12 hours a day, and the hours I was awake, it felt like I was dying. And it wasn't like I had to force myself to sleep, my body was naturally making me sleep longer so I wouldn't end up dying. And gee, would you guess what? When I got better, I went back to my normal 6-7 hours of sleeping!

      Does anyone want to fund my study? I'm going to see if age has anything to do with death.

    • Re:post & propter and all that .... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by President Chimp Toe ( 552720 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @08:34AM (#3025913)
      Yes, causation is a well known problem in science. In particular, so-called "confounding factors". To illustrate the point, I shall use an example:

      A few years ago it was widely publicised that that drinking red wine was healthy and made you live longer. The research was published and looked solid. However, the researchers had not accounted for the confounding factor of lifestyle. People who drink red wine tend to be richer, live healthier lifestyles and drink in moderation (e.g. like the french - a glass or two of wine with dinner every day). However, beer drinkers tend to "binge-drink", and although they may drink the same units of alcohol as a wine drinker, they tend to consume them all in one sitting.

      In fact, it turns out that drinking a small amount of alcohol every day is good for you (which red wine drinkers do), wherease too much alcohol is obviously bad.

      These types of mistakes in science still occur with alarming regularity, especially as sometimes the confounding factors can be subtle, confusing and unexpected. However, the researchers who conducted this study seem well aware of the problem. The last sentance of their abstract reads:

      "Causality is unproven."

      As the researchers are well aware, it is quite likely that this is an indirect relationship between life expectancy/sleep that we are observing.

      For example (i may get flamed for this, but i'm just brainstorming), many of the great achievers I have met in my life slept very little - they were too energetic, alive and aspirational to lye in bed. They also achieved (or will achieve) great things - they are rich, have a good lifestyle and medical cover etc.

      Alot of the "layabout" types I have met seemed far more interested in spending 12+ hours in bed than actually doing anything with there life.

      I am sure the problem is far more complex than this, but you can see how other factors may form tentative links between cause and effect.
      • Plus, wine is made from fruit. Do any of these studies compare a wine-drinking group to one that eats a lot of fruit? I'd wager that you could get all the benefits described in these studies with none of the potential downfalls of alchohol just by eating more fruit.
        • Alcohol has a blood thinning property. This is currently believed to be the source of much of the aparent health benefits of moderate alcohol consumption -- thinning the blood reduces the risk of stroke and heart disease substantially.

          Taking a half dose of asprin/day has a similar effect, and is a lot cheaper and safer than alcohol, but not nearly as much fun :)
          • I'd have to question the "safer than alcahol" comment. Mild intake of alcahol posses little health risk to anyone with a half-decent lifestyle. Even for a lot of less-than-perfect lifestyles, a glass or two of wine or beer a day (beer not so good, too many calories) or even a shot or two will be a good thing.

            Aspirin, depending on the age and other medical conditions, can cause a variety of unpleasant side effects. Now, admittedly, the amount of aspirin we're talking about for a daily dose is low so probably presents no significant risk if you don't have a sensibility or some other health issues.

            Both thin the blood. Alcohol is (I beleive) also supposed to drop your blood cholestorol level. I know my doctor suggested that I could take a drink a day (gotta love a prescription I enjoy!) and I find it preferable to taking aspirin (far tastier).
          • Have you ever actually tasted aspirin? Wretched stuff . . . but once, the searing headache was bad enough that once they found the bottle in Costco, I ripped it open (or did they?) and was chewing immediately.


            Kinds of citrusy behind the wretchedness.


            hawk, who hopes never to do that again, and needs to figure out which red wines are giving him sinus headaches

      • Knitting up the ravl'd sleeve (Score:4, Insightful)

        by hey! ( 33014 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @12:03PM (#3026726) Homepage Journal
        Alot of the "layabout" types I have met seemed far more interested in spending 12+ hours in bed than actually doing anything with there life.


        It isn't just a lack of joie de vivre; hypersomnia (sleeping a long time) can be a sign of serious chronic illness such as major depression.

        The press is picking up on this as a "sleep is bad for you" story. In fact, another interpretation that fits the observation equally well is that health people require less sleep than people with chronic illness. In that case, it would be very unfortunate if people take this to mean they can improve their health by reducing the amount they sleep, because this would very likely injure it.

        • I'm glad somebody understands what us insomniacs go through. Before I started taking Wellbutrin a month ago, to treat my major depression, I was unable to concentrate or mentally function without at least eight hours of sleep or more. Probably because the quality of my sleep was poor. Now, I seem to be able to get by on seven hours, and three or four in a pinch. Whenever I've told anyone that I NEED eight hours of sleep to concentrate, they've looked at me like I was stupid. Of course, that's nowhere near as bad as trying to explain to someone with a normal circadian rhythym why my Delayed Phase Sleep Disorder makes it next to impossible for me to get a good nights sleep if I go to bed before 3:00am. (No matter how long I keep morning hours, I never adjust.) Even if they do understand, it falls back to, "Oh, well you got four hours of sleep huh? Well I only get by on two hours of sleep a night so you've got it better than me."

          That reminds me; have you ever noticed that however much sleep you tell somebody you need, they always say that they get by on less? This applies almost no matter how little sleep you claim you need! If you say, "I need eight hours," they say they need six. If you say you need six hours, they say they need four. If you say you need four, they say that they get by on two. It's astute of you to notice that the press picked up on this. The moment I read about this study I KNEW that people would misread it to justify our American culture of sleep deprivation machismo.

          The fact that your knowledge and attitude is in the minority scares me. You would think that personel managers would appreciate the fact that somebody wants the night job they're offering because they like the hours. Nope! Not at all. If you tell a personel manager that you're a night owl, even if it's a night shift position they want to fill, most of them will treat you like you're lazy and try to rush the interview to get you out of their office ASAP. Like you, I think that this study has the potential to do more harm than good if it's misunderstood.
        • is that health people require less sleep than people with chronic illness

          This just shows that things aren't cut and dried either. Though I totally agree with your comment, I'd like to point out that some manic people (or manic-depressive) can go through very active phases and require very little sleep. Yet they are not entirely well.

          One theory I had heard suggested this is a form of illness that befell Winston Churchill during WW2 (and the Blitz particularly). And the claim was made that his inexhaustible energy was part of what kept Britain glued together and probably could not have been supplied by a normal,healthy individual.

          Humans are pretty complex.... jumping from datum to conclusion is often like trying a triple jump on a bed of nails... kind of likely to be painful.

      • My favorite illustration of how easily such studies can confound cause and effect is this:

        Persons with dirty yellowish stains between their fingers have a propensity to die of lung cancer, emphysema and heart disease with a striking degree of regularity over the population at large.
        The standard conclusion would be that washing one's hands to remove such stains would be a great way to improve one's health.

        But, as you may have guessed by now, quitting smoking is the prime underlying factor in reducing such stains.

    • Yep... an earlier study found that people who slept more than 16 hours per day were over 80 times as likely as the control group to die of Sleeping Sickness! :)
  • ...but you'll feel like it ;-)

    • Obligatory "Dune" Quote (Score:2, Interesting)

      by devphil ( 51341 )


      I believe it's the third Dune book where, after spending the entire night talking and debating with Duncan Idaho, Stilgar looks out at the rising sun and says, "To stay awake all night is to add a day to your life."

      (Okay, Stil, how come it's 4 in the morning for me, I can't sleep, and I feel like a fukkin corpse? :-) Blah, I hate insomnia.)

      • Sounds like me...

        I worked a graveyard shift job for about 3 months. The money was really good. Alas, I quit and took a better job from 4-10pm. So, I get off work every night and fall asleep around 6 AM. If the sun comes up before I fall asleep, then I have to stay awake another day. However, I get up at 1pm every day. This isn't a requirement; I've contracted long term(4+ years) insomnia from that stupid freaking graveyard job. It won't go away. I've tried everything including sedatives but that just makes it worse. Why can't I sleep when the sun is on the other side of the planet!!!????

  • Could it be... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by oz1cz ( 535384 )
    Could it be that they are confusing cause and effect?

    I would guess that many healthy persons lead busy lives and therefore have less time for sleep. Whereas some people with poor health may need more sleep.

  • Write 500 Times... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Detritus ( 11846 )
    Correlation is not causation.
  • Wow, they really know their logic! Sleep longer, your days are shorter.. sleep less, your days are longer, hence you live for longer, wow!

    Really though, I'm screwed. I sleep at least 10/11 hours every night, and my 'record' was 20. Start building my coffin.

    I'm guessing it's just a slow news day on Slashdot.. this story was discussed several days ago [metafilter.com] on MetaFilter. Lots of interesting comments, check it out.

  • Repeat after me... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Ikari Gendo ( 202183 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @03:44AM (#3025231) Homepage

    ...correlation is not causation. Who sleeps more than average? Old people, sick people, and depressed people. I'm not surprised to find out they have a shorter life expectancy.

  • Well... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Thornae ( 53316 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @03:44AM (#3025233)
    ... there goes one of the last objections to my intraveneous caffiene drip!

  • Argghhh! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by AnonymousHero ( 129337 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @03:45AM (#3025235)
    If I could tattoo one thing on everyone's head, it'd be: "Correlation does not equal causation!"

    This study does not mean that if you sleep less, you will live longer. A correlation has been found, that's all. Maybe people who sleep less have better circulation, also linked with long life. Or maybe the space aliens who shorten life spend two hours a night doing it.

    Point is, we don't know what's causing this effect, at least not from this article.
    • Yeah, this is definatley one for the junk science bin.

      Besides what they dont tell you is the people who only get 7 hours of sleep are fucking miserable because they're tired their entire life.

      I dont care what they say sleep is good for you :)

    • Re:Argghhh! (Score:2, Funny)

      by Alsee ( 515537 )
      If I could tattoo one thing on everyone's head, it'd be: "Mostly Stupid"

      -

    • Re:Argghhh! (Score:5, Informative)

      by dragons_flight ( 515217 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @06:12AM (#3025611) Homepage
      I tried submitting the Reuters version [yahoo.com] a couple days ago.

      It's mostly the same stuff, but there are a couple of quotes that I found highly interesting which are missing from the version /. linked.

      "...the study shows that longer sleep is a risk factor for cancer as well as heart disease and stroke... Heart disease was the most common cause of death, followed by stroke and cancer."

      "...some sleep loss actually acts as an antidepressant."

      It's correlation certainly, but at least the other version of the story tells you what lots of sleep has been correllated to.
      • "...some sleep loss actually acts as an antidepressant."

        My current theory is that people will become depressed if they think deeply. By being sleep-deprived and caffeinated, they will not be mentally alert enough to realize how deeply life sucks, and how unfair the world is.

        Depression is bad for your life expectancy (my assertion), so sleeping less will increase your life expectancy given that you won't be so depressed when you're no longer fully awake. Isn't that a beautiful theory of the causality between long life, sleep deprivation and happiness? Now how do I test it?!

    • Or perhaps it's the other way around: people with various diseases sleep more because the disorders drain their energy?
    • Exactly..
      [from the study abstract]
      CONCLUSIONS: Patients can be reassured that short sleep and insomnia seem associated with little risk distinct from comorbidities. Slight risks associated with 8 or more hours of sleep and sleeping pill use need further study.

      -Slight risks- and the wording "need further study" indicates that this is not quite a hard scientific fact. It doesn't mean sleeping less means you live longer.

      It means that it may be a factor, and more studies need to be done.

    • Point is, we don't know what's causing this effect, at least not from this article.

      But at least we know what to answer on our life insurance application for "average hours of sleep per day".

    • >If I could tattoo one thing on everyone's head,
      >it'd be: "Correlation does not equal causation!"


      Well, almost. The back of the hand or eyelids, or the back of the person in front's head . . .


      I tell my stat classes that they should chant "correllation does not imply causation" several minutes each night, and offer a bonus point on the last test for remembering to work the mantra in . . .


      hawk

  • Living longer? (Score:5, Funny)

    by meth88 ( 550714 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @03:45AM (#3025237)
    All this living longer is killing me.
  • Note the phrase at the end of the abstract - "Causality Unproven". While I'm sure that they corrected for what factors they could, I think it's at least plausible that various illnesses that might cause you to require more sleep (for example, by reducing the quality of the sleep that you get) might contribute to higher mortality rates amongst those who get more sleep.

    So the study hardly offers a prescription for longer life; on the other hand, it's a pretty impressive rebuttal to any idea that people who sleep less than 8 hours are going to have problems as a result.
  • The increased risk exceeded 15% for those reporting more than 8.5 hours sleep or less than 3.5 or 4.5 hours

    Dammit. I knew this was too good to be true.
    • ... or less than 3.5 or 4.5 hours

      Strange, what do they mean by that? Wouldn't "less than 4.5 hours" enough as last time I checked 3.5 is less than 4.5?

  • Flawed Study? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Mattygfunk ( 517948 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @03:47AM (#3025248) Homepage
    This article [cnn.com] from CNN reports the same thing. However, in this article The National Sleep Foundation suggests that the study may be flawed, and will do nothing but cause the public unnecessary confusion and concern.
    • ... the study may be flawed, and will do nothing but cause the public unnecessary confusion and concern

      And just how would this be different from the endless contradictory studies that say [INSERT YOUR FAVORITE FOOD HERE] is good for you -- no, wait! it's bad for you -- no, wait again! it's good! -- no, it's bad... ad infinitum
    • Ahh, but maybe that's the point, so they lie awake at night worrying about the fact that they sleep too much, thus prolonging their life..
    • Did you read the original article? There are some interesting swipes against the National Sleep Foundation:
      ---
      'Kripke, whose study was funded by federal tax dollars, said doctors' recommendations that everyone get eight hours of sleep a night may have been influenced partly by companies that make sleeping pills. He cited a report from a public relations firm representing the maker of the medicine Ambien, which gave the National Sleep Foundation money to alert people about an insomnia "public health crisis" as part of a marketing campaign.

      Both Buysse and Walsh have served as paid consultants to sleeping-pill makers, but both denied being influenced by that. Walsh said most researchers in the field have accepted consulting fees from the companies, because "99 percent of the funding to support this type of research is from pharmaceutical companies." '
      ---
      Now, you can put whatever weight you want into this suggestion of bias. But at least the Washington Post, unlike CNN, alerted us to what *might* be exacerbating the conflict between the scientists here.

  • Umm (Score:2, Funny)

    by MacroRex ( 548024 )
    So does this mean that programs that usleep() rather than sleep() have longer lifecycles?

  • Correlation != Causation (Score:3, Insightful)

    by GNU Zealot ( 442308 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @03:47AM (#3025255) Homepage
    Something to really keep in mind when looking at psychological/physiological studies is that correlation and causation are two different things. In order to show causation, you need to do more than just show that two things are correlated. Just becuase those that happened to sleep less tend to live longer, doesn't mean that if you sleep less you'll live longer.

    One of the best examples of the difference between correlation and causation is that when ice cream sales go up murder rates also tend to go up. So if you start eating more ice cream will you be more violence prone? Nope, it's just that in the summer both ice cream sales and murder rates happen to go up. Must be the heat or something.

  • Symptom or Cause? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by bravehamster ( 44836 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @03:48AM (#3025259) Homepage Journal
    The report seems to come to the conclusion that just because people sleep less and live longer, the former causes the latter. It seems much more likely to me that the amount of sleep you get is indicative of what type of lifestyle you lead. Active people are less likely to oversleep and active people usually live longer. Also, depressed people usually sleep more than happier people, and depression can be linked to whole range of health problems that can affect your lifespan.

    Another possibility is that people who sleep less get more done, and are therefore more likely to be successful in what they do. This means that they would have a higher standard of living, leading to a longer lifespan. These are just ones I've come up with off the top of my head, so I'd say that less sleep does not lead to a longer life, but just is indicative of a lifestyle that would.

    Oh, and when you're awake you can watch for bears and enemies attacking your cave. Natural selection probably favors those who sleep less ;)

  • I got only one comment... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by thanq ( 321486 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @03:52AM (#3025271)

    Quoting the article:

    "The amount of sleep you get impacts how alert you are, your risk for accidents, how you perform at work and school," said James Walsh, president of the National Sleep Foundation (...)"There's much more to life than how long you live."

    Bullseye. Interestingly, the article does not specify exactly how more sleep would decrease your lifespan.

    Hey, if I can sleep 9 hours a day, be rested the next day, and live to be 80 and die, I will do it! Is there really anyone who would want to sleep 6 hours a day, be constantly tired throughout their lifetime, and then die at an age of 100 where last 20 years where spent in a bed with bunch of tubes going from their body and the 'beep...beep' sound of the EKG machine at all machine?

    Makes me wanna sleep in more. And take naps. Three times a day.

    • Actually they've found that most people who've reached 100 actually tend to be in better shape than the average 80 year old.

    • How much sleep? (Score:3, Informative)

      by autechre ( 121980 )
      Other studies have shown that different people need different amounts of sleep to function best. The "average" is between 5 and 10 hours of sleep.

      If you really need 10 hours of sleep, and you believe in the old "8 hours per night for everyone", you will be tired all the time. You'll probably sleep in on weekends, which disrupts your sleep cycle, and makes you even more tired when you get up on Monday.

      On the other hand, if you should really be sleeping 7 hours per night and you get 8 or 9, you will also feel tired. Many people have found that a gradual, planned cutback of the number of hours they sleep has led to increased energy. This has also been used as an effective treatment for depression.

      The important thing is to figure out how much sleep you need, and keep up (as near as possible) a steady sleep schedule, even through the weekend. You should also avoid things like alchohol and caffeine up to several hours before bedtime, as these will decrease the quality of your sleep, though they might not keep you awake.

  • ...when they come out with another study that says heavy sleepers live longer? You know it will happen. It always does.

  • Potential reasons for the outcome (Score:3, Interesting)

    by BWJones ( 18351 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @04:00AM (#3025299) Homepage Journal
    There are many potential confounds for this study that can provide these results, most notably their use of cancer patients as subjects. Most studies to date indicate an average need for approximately 8hrs of sleep per night are needed for an adult. However, those folks that have poor quality of sleep caused by factors such as sleep apnea or pain management issues among others where the architecture of sleep and quality of sleep are radically altered would need to spend longer amounts of time "sleeping" or more appropriately time in bed to acheive the required rest due to poor quality of sleep. These causes of longer "sleep" times are themselves responsible for higher morbidity and mortality.

    Finally it should be noted that for a long time it has been known that there is a high degree of variation in the amount of sleep required by people and most of the variation is due to self reporting inconsistencies. (in other words people underreport the amount of time they actually sleep for a variety of reasons) Actual sleep recording or polysomnography narrows this variation considerably.

  • I just slept 15 hours! (Score:4, Funny)

    by codexus ( 538087 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @04:00AM (#3025303)
    I wake up, and the first thing I do is read slashdot where I learn that I've just decreased my life expectancy. That's a good way to start the week :)
  • I can see it now - the next big project deadline, the manager says "And according to recent studies, this will help you live longer too!".

    Though I admit it would be very nice if caffeine actually did lengthen life (as opposed ot just making it seem to be lived faster) ...

    Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org) [sethf.com]

  • Some quotes selected with bias. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Nindalf ( 526257 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @04:15AM (#3025348)
    "'None of this says sleep kills people,' said Daniel Buysse, a University of Pittsburgh psychiatrist and the immediate past president of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. 'You should sleep as much as you need to feel awake, alert and attentive the next day...'"

    "Sleeplessness produces health consequences that were not measured in the study,"

    "The study relied on people's own reports of their sleeping habits,"
    (very few reported that they had "CowboyNeal" hours of sleep)

    "'You can choose to eat a Twinkie or a carrot, but I can't choose to sleep 12 hours or six -- I don't have that much voluntary control.'"

    I dunno. It seems pretty obvious to me that, all else being equal, people tend to sleep longer when they are unhealthy because they are unhealthy. While I hesitate to use the term... Who am I kidding? I think people who are interpreting this as "Sleep less, live longer" are total Bozos, and I think the popular press is being irresponsible in their desire for a sensational story, as usual.
  • Do all of the late night parties at university(ie. sleep deprivation) cancel out the ill effects of said parties?

    I damn well hope so!

    I think my life-expectancy might still be slightly in the negative ledger as a result of the party experiences, but it's nice to know there's a counter

  • hmmmm (Score:2, Funny)

    by sewagemaster ( 466124 )
    my ex-girlfriend is ALWAYS sleeping around...

    she's gonna die young - that's what she gets for doing what she's doing!! hehe :)
  • Now all I need is beer, video games and hacking to be linked to living longer and I'm set.

    ps - I mean what else am I going to do when its 3:20 in the morning... oh wait, we have slashdot for that ;-)

  • In related news... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by gnovos ( 447128 ) <gnovos@ c h i p p e d . net> on Monday February 18, 2002 @04:26AM (#3025369) Homepage Journal
    ...Studies found that many people undergoing chemotherapy eventually die of cancer. The number was so high, in fact, that the only conclusion we can draw is that chemotheraphy causes cancer.

    And tonight at 10: "Tylenol: headache in a bottle?"
  • So when I have kids, am I supposed to let them stay up late? Ok besides that... somethings I'd like to see *wink, wink, nudge, nudge, you know who you are research people* linked to living longer:

    1)Beer

    2)Video Games

    3)hacking

    4)the simpsons

    5)smokes

    6)anything else that a decent slacker needs

    Now some stuff I'd like to see linked to a shorter life:

    1)DMCA

    2)homework and goddamn flowcharts

    3)talk shows like springer

    4)anyone that comes into the helpdesk i work at

    5)anything that pisses me off

  • Is that "Causality is unproven." in the study. So while they may be able to say that there is a correlation between 7 hours of sleep and longer life spans, it is not deterimined whether the 7 hours of sleep is actually causing longer life.

    It could instead be something completely unrelated to sleep, but rather related to some other behaviour that the 7 hour sleepers engage in.

  • As a student at Stanford University, I'm currently in a course called Sleep and Dreams [stanford.edu], taught by the world's leading sleep expert, Dr. William Dement. It's an awesome class; he's really hammered home the concept of a sleep debt-he's been doing research on this field since the early 1950's, and has pioneered the concept of a sleep debt: typically you need 8 hrs and 15 minutes; if you get any less, it goes into a sleep debt that gets progressively worse. He's provided lots of evidence; I'm inclined to believe him more. The course books are huge, but read the lecture notes if you're interested...
  • What does that say for those of us that stay up for 36 hours, then sleep for 10? Other than the fact that we don't have a clue what time of day it is... ;-)
  • There are three fundamental flaws with the study:
    • The amounts of sleep were self-reported. People notoriously underestimate the amount of sleep they get.
    • Any correlation doesn't tell you anything about causation. Sleeping a lot may be a consequence of a pre-existing medical condition, not a cause of death.
    • The sample population isn't randomly selected.

    I suspect that the subjects in the study underreported the amount of sleep they got by about 1h. I also suspect that the people who slept unusually much in the study probably already had a medical condition that then later killed them.

  • Heavy sleeping indicates lazyness -> unhealthy lifestyle.
  • according to this study [alexchiu.com], if you wear a special kind of ring on your pinky fingers while you sleep, you will live forever!

  • Sure you will live longer but... (Score:5, Funny)

    by DanThe1Man ( 46872 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @05:29AM (#3025517)
    Sure you will live longer, but you won't remeber it. [slashdot.org]
  • I was about to have a good nights sleep but then I saw this story and by the time I posted this comment it was past 2:30 and the worries about the hazardous effects to my health of sleeping in will keep me up all night so I won't get any sleep. Thanks /. for keeping my health at heart!
  • This is another case of the wrong conclusion being drawn from statistics.

    I'll give another example:
    People living near HV power lines have a higher chance of getting cancer.
    Incorrect conclusion:
    HV power lines cause cancer.

    The failure is not looking at the whole situation. Further investigation reveals that most people living near HV power lines also live alongside superhighways, and the cause of their higher risk of cancer is exhaust fumes.

    In the case of sleep: most people who sleep more than 8 hours a day are unhealthy "slobs" who also eat badly and don't get any exercise.

    People who sleep less than 8 hrs a day are usually succesful people who also happen to enjoy sport and a good diet.

  • So there is no evidence here to suggest that the causal relationship works the way they are suggesting. Could it be that *shock horror* fat lazy smoking slobs sleep lots whilst physically active non-smokers with fulfilling jobs and families sleep less?


    /tom

  • Behavior that correlates abnormal sleep habits with shorter lifespan:
    • Drug abuse
    • Alcohol abuse
    • Sleep deprivation leading to accidents
    • Depression
    • Stress
    • Unrelieved pain; use of pain killers

    In other words, life shortening events can cause abnormal sleep habits, not the other way around.

  • The average age of the people in this study was late 50s.

    I believe it's pretty well established that the need for sleep decreases with age.

    So, don't start setting your alarm earlier just yet.

  • Just because people sleeping longer died younger doesn't mean that doing so is the cause. There could likely be a third factor causing both, such as laziness and general lack of exercise.

    Quoth the abstract, "Causality is unproven."

    It's unfortunate that this point is lost by the time the article makes it's way from a medical journal to a newspaper to Slashdot.
  • Another recent study showed that sleeping less would increase insulin resistance, which would definitely shorten lifespan. And that study actually showed probable causation, unlike the 'study' referenced above.

    It continually amazes me what passes for science in the fields of nutrition and sleep. Most of the studies I've read in these two areas would not get a passing grade in a high school science class.
  • Dr. William Dement of Stanford University is recognized as the world's leading expert on sleep and sleep disorders [sleepquest.com].

    I took his class and it was very interesting. One of the most memorable things that I learned is that there is no single "right amount of sleep" for everyone. Some people need more, others need less. The range that he reports is 2 to 10 hours a night. If you need 6 hours a night then that is what you need and 8 is too much. If you need 9 then you had better get 9 and getting less is harmful. Here [sleepquest.com] is what his website has to say on the subject.

    One of the other very interesting things I learned in his class was the concept of sleep latency. He has developed tests that can actually measure how sleep deprived a person is. Once you accumulate sleep debt it doesn't go away until you make that sleep up. Thus if you are a person who needs 7 hours of sleep a night and one night you only get 4 hours of sleep you will be sleep deprived until you make up that 3 hours that you missed. You can do the next night by sleeping 10 hours or you could continue to sleep 7 hours a night and run around sleep deprived for months until you make up the sleep.

    I would trust his opinion more than some researchers who do not specialize in sleep and merely noticed a correlation while conducting a study that wasn't related to sleep or sleep disorders. On the subject of life expectancy he actually mentioned in class that life expectancy is correlated with the amount on sleep that you need each night. Someone who needs only 4 hours of sleep each night, he used President Clinton as an example, will have a shorter life expectancy. This directly contradicts the study mentioned in this article.

    • Your expert's site is interesting but is mainly focused on apnea and its treatments. The section on sleep and drugs is 'being revised' and there is nothing there. It is too bad as it probally would have explained that it is not the quantity of sleep that is important but the quality or amount of deep sleep usually associated with Rapid eye movement(REM). Drugs (especially caffine and alchohol) can prevent deep sleep and after 10 hours you can still wake up feeling tired. The body tries to compensate for lack of deep sleep by increasing lenght of deep sleep the next night(REM rebound) but if the drugs are still present it is a never ending game of catch up until there are serious health problems. The best thing to do is avoid caffine and alchohol in the evening. Go to bed at the same time and get plenty of exercise.
  • As reported in Globe and Mail article today [globeandmail.com] The study wasn't specifically designed to consider the effects of sleep on longevity, and that it was skewed by the number of people who sleep more than eight hours because of medical problems. It didn't ask participants whether they napped in the afternoon, and it didn't watch them sleep; it just asked them to recall their sleep pat- terns.
    So the conclusion is suspect, and thank heavens for that. We'd hate to think it might have become politically incorrect to curse the alarm clock.

    Also when it comes to statistics I always ask myself whether the n's justify the means.

  • in this case I think I'll just throw caution to the wind.

  • The evils of statistics. (Score:3, Informative)

    by mindstrm ( 20013 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @11:36AM (#3026588)
    Couple of points.
    First... this does not mean that "IF you sleep less you will live longer"

    It just means that there is some relation between lifespan and sleep. It could also be that those who live longer tend to have lifestyles that involve getting up earlier.
    Or that, for some reason, those predisposed to along life just plain sleep less.

    Also... not getting your 8 hours? Think you can get by on 4 or 5 hours a night? I've heard people say that...

    Studies show very conclusively that you basically need 8 hours of sleep a night. If you don't get it one night, you'll make up for it later. When you don't sleep enough, you accumulate a 'sleep-debt' that the body WILL pay off eventually, even over a span of months.
    Stayed up on speed for 3 days? You might not sleep for 24 hours straight afterwards.. but you WILL catch up over the next few days.

  • Anyone looking to buy stock in Jolt cola in hopes they found the fountain of youth should read the final line of the abstract.

    Causality is unproven.

    While it is an interesting finding and deserves to be looked at further. The big problem is that data was originally collected as part of a Cancer study and like most cancer studies it only looks at data over a relatively short period of time (6 years). So the tagline should more accurately read,

    People who sleep more or less than 7 hours per day are more likely to die in the next six years.

    Going back to the original point, the only mechanism they propose to account for more sleep causing correlating with increased death is that people with sleep apnea (stoping breathing while asleep) have higer mortality rates. However they also point out that people with sleep apnea do not necessarily sleep longer.

    So basically they have no clue as to why.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Exercise, caffeine, stress (Score:3, Insightful)

    by coyote-san ( 38515 ) on Monday February 18, 2002 @01:17PM (#3027154)
    Everyone has jumped on the causality bandwagon, and not taken the next step.

    If this correlation is true, what controllable factors cause a person to sleep longer each night?

    Some of the answers are well known:

    • lack of exercise
    • caffeine consumption
    • stress

    All interfere with your body's ability to reach the deepest levels of sleep, so it takes longer to have the same amount of rest. At least two of the three factors are also associated with shortened lifespan.

    Is the study totally worthless? No. It proves that you don't need to subject yourself to a dozen separate tests to determine how well you are managing these long-term risks - keeping track of the number of hours you sleep is sufficient.

  • Just more evidence that stationary (biological) clocks run faster.
  • It seems to me, people sleep different lengths of time on different nights, depending on the circumstances.

    For example, I caught a cold on Friday night. I slept for several hours more than usual on both Sat. and Sun. night. I probably could have gotten up sooner, but I chose to go back to sleep when I woke up once or twice, knowing that the extra rest would help me get over the cold more quickly.

    The rest of last week though, I know I got less sleep than usual. I woke up tired each morning, and could barely get out of bed.

    Well, if you take the *average* of all of this, I bet it shows that I slept approximately 7 to 7.5 hours per night. Therefore, I'd be doing exactly what I'm supposed to be doing, according to this study. In reality, I probably got too little sleep all week long, causing me to get sick - and then tried to make up for it over the weekend. Not exactly a recommended sleep cycle!

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