Napoleon Bonaparte famously claimed to need only 3-4 hours of sleep a night while conquering Europe, but for most people, the ill-effects of sleeplessness are legion: brain fog, impaired judgment and motor skills, reduced metabolism, disrupted immune system, risk of accidents when driving and of dementia in later life, to list but a few.
Getting seven or more hours shut-eye a night not only puts a line through most of the above, but it can even reduce loneliness, according to results of a survey presented at an American Academy of Sleep Medicine and Sleep Research Society conference in Houston.
"Better sleep health was associated with significantly lower total loneliness, emotional loneliness and social loneliness," the researchers announced ahead of the June 1-5 event.
The link between getting a good night’s sleep and being less lonely was found to be stronger among younger people, according to the team, which analysed almost 2,300 participants’ answers to questions about sleeping habits and socialising.
In a paper published last month in the journal Sleep, the researchers recommended "promoting sleep health" as a potential "untapped avenue to support efforts and programs that aim to reduce loneliness."
"Loneliness is an urgent public health crisis, and there is a pressing need for providers to better understand and treat it," said Joseph Dzierzewski, co-author and vice president of the National Sleep Foundation in the US.
Bad sleep is sometimes caused by sleep apnea, a common condition that causes a sufferer to snore and to wake multiple times during the night, disrupting the sleep of others within earshot. No surprise, therefore, that treating apnea can result in happier relationships, according to researchers from the RAND Corporation and the University of Utah, who also presented their findings at the Houston conference.
