Walk into any college classroom and you will see the same situation: students and professors alike with giant mugs full of caffeinated beverages, coffee and coke being the most prevalent. If you look closely at the students, you will see huge bags and dark circles around their eyes, at least one-third of the class will be nodding off or staring in a daze; this state of being is not due to the content of the lecture not being stimulating, but due to a lack of sleep. A combination of late nights studying and doing homework, early morning workouts and eight am classes, in addition to long days filled with work or involvement in various clubs all act together to cause a case of sleep deprivation for more than half of the college community. There …show more content…
Sleep is a complex cycle generated by the brain that consists of 24 hours of regulated wake and sleep stages. This cycle is called the circadian rhythm which is mostly stable, but can be altered by light and individual differences; the individual differences are classified as an either/or dichotomy: you’re a morning person, or you are a not a morning person (Kalat 2013). In normal individuals, sleep is an automatic process; we can fight against it for a while, but eventually the sleep cycle will restore itself, causing the individual to fall asleep at inappropriate times, like during the middle of a lecture, driving down the highway, or while operating heavy machinery. To understand why the circadian rhythm works so hard to stay regulated requires knowledge about the way sleep works and its adaptive …show more content…
These studies involve depriving participants of sleep for various amounts of time; the time kept awake is determined by the dependent variables of the study. When measuring the effects of sleep deprivation, chronic and mild, you look at changes in eating habits or fluctuations in caloric intake, cognitive tasks usually mathematical in nature, reaction time, and memory tasks. For cognitive tasks, usually you would deprive participants of sleep for longer durations than you would for reaction time tasks and fluctuations in caloric
Give a one-sentence definition of internal validity. As an example, I’m going to conduct a study that deprives college students of sleep, to prove their grades will go down as a result. If I found a link between reduced sleep and reduced grades, what is an internally valid conclusion about the results of this study (be specific)?
The students could rate their current mood on a scale from zero to seven. The higher the
This source was produced by The Media Production Group at Dartmouth and Dr. Carl P. Thum, Director of the Dartmouth Academic Skills Center. Carl Thum himself works with students at Dartmouth University in which he provides coaching for students suffering from ADD and also leads various workshops, mini-courses, and coaching sessions for students as well. In this video, several students and faculty members are interviewed on the relationship between sleep and being a college student. In the various interviews, the students admit to the struggles they have in being able to function when suffering from sleep deprivation and how severely the lives are affected from it. The faculty members themselves admit to the several instances in which they have witnessed students suffer as a result of sleep deprivation in their testimonials. I will be incorporating this video to indicate the varying degrees at which sleep deprivation can affect students and will include quotes from other students in this video in order to create more relatability for the reader when hearing from students besides myself and how they have learned to address sleep.
Sleep deprivation is a serious concern among college students, who are "among the most sleep-deprived age group in the United States," (Central Michigan University, 2008). It is important to study the causes of sleep deprivation, or sleep disorders, among college students. According to Park (2009), "dozens of studies have linked an increase in nightly sleep to better cognition and alertness." A study by Central Michigan University (2008) found that sleep deprivation can lead to poor academic performance, impaired driving, depression, and behavioral problems. There are several variables that may affect sleeping patterns among college students. One is genetics or biological issues. It is highly
Many college students seem to suffer from sleep debt due to the fact they have a busy schedule, have to manage stress, and also try to live a healthy lifestyle. I think it is so common amongst college students since many students, including myself, struggle with time management. Struggling with time management usually results in students procrastinating and leaving school work to do very late, which results in students not getting a good night’s rest. Another reason as to why students have sleep debt is due to the fact that our generation loves to stimulate the brain with multiple and constant sensory inputs, such as listening to music, texting, watching TV, or playing video games. These engaging activities can exhaust your brain and impede
Specific Purpose: Sleep and college students usually don’t tend to get along very well. Sleep and college life often bump heads due to stress, coursework and social activities. This speech will give the students useful information about dangers of not getting enough sleep and also hints on how to get a better nights sleep.
Research indicates that America’s sleep problems have increased and might be the number one health problem. The average amount of sleep that people get per night can range anywhere from three to twelve hours. According to Dr. David Dinges at the University of Pennsylvania, it is a fact that people who get fewer than six hours of sleep a night do not live as long as people who get seven hours or more. Most people do not realize the importance of sleep or even realize that it is needed to survive. Many people experience sleep deprivation; however it is commonly seen in college students. Irregular sleeping patterns tend to occur in students, which can later lead to long-term effects.
Thesis Statement: When the projects, exams, and extra-curricular activities start to pile up on one another it seems as though there is not enough time in the day. This is when college students tend to lose precious hours of sleep and the consequences can be costly.
Lastly, the long-term effect and the most common consequences are mood and behavior. Usually, changes in mood and behavior are the first signals and symptoms that show individuals are suffering from sleep deprivation. Before experiencing hallucinations and motor and cognitive impairment, the first symptom that was shown in Gardner’s behavior was mood and behavior change. “Sleep and emotion are closely linked, however, the effects of sleep on socio-emotion task performance have only recently been investigated” (Beattie et al., 2014). People who are usually gentle and soft will become aggressive and depressive, people become sensitive to their surroundings, or individuals feel more irritable, hostile, and angry when they experience sleep loss. According to Kushida (2005), “mood changes commonly include
Students who usually stay up late and get little sleep do not think of the consequences for the next day. Frequently, a majority of these students arrive at class only to fall the next day only to fall asleep after the professor starts the lecture. The poor behavior problem usually leads to low attendance rates and poor grades among sleep deprived students (Johnson). For first time freshmen, sleep deprivation has been known to cause a variety of issues that can lead to grave harm. Sleep deprivation can cause slow reaction time as well as headaches and nightmares more frequently. The mind will fall asleep if it cannot get enough sleep causing it to not function properly. Some side effects insomnia are feeling fatigue, depressed or a feeling of the body being completely drained (Haynes). One of these issues
Are you tired and having trouble paying attention in class? Focusing on tasks at hand? Or just completely being overall unproductive? The average college student is deprived at least two full hours asleep each night according to “College Tidbits” a website designed to promote healthy lifestyles and productivity in daily college life. These results were pooled from multiple surveys done over hundreds of campuses throughout the United States. Today, I hope to persuade you to fight the statistics and get those extra two hours of sleep. Do what it takes to get the full seven to nine hours that is suggested by the Mayo Clinic. I will discuss two problems. Why college students are not
Sleep is an essential fuel in balancing a college student’s performance; being crucial for learning, and physical and mental health. The consistency of a good quantity of sleep (8 to 9 hours) lays great importance beyond many of a college student; yet progressively, sleep deprivation among college students is still at its worse and has not changed in college students since the olden days, when today it is still not healthy. This ultimately factors into a college student’s grade point average ( consequently lowering it), “increased risk of academic failure, compromised learning, impaired mood, and increased risk of motor vehicle accidents”[1] Though, students tend to prioritize their matters in work, homework,
Perhaps an underappreciated issue faced by many high school campuses is students sleeping in class, or in more appropriate terms, students not getting enough sleep. “Wake up!” solves the problem for many teachers, but this solution is dated and ineffective. While the students eyes may open, their brains remain functionally inert, and no matter how much a teacher tries to keep their attention, a half-asleep student will never learn as effectively as a fully awake and attentive student. This doesn’t seem like it should even be an issue, after all, the students with this problem just need to manage their sleep more responsibly. Less electronics, earlier bedtimes, and easier course selection all seem to present viable solutions and are often preached as the best ways to deal with the problem. Unfortunately, this is hardly the case.
Sleep is a crucial component of everyday life. In fact, I would go as far to say that it is as important as the water we drink, the food we eat, and the air that we breathe. However, as it goes to show, many students are not getting enough sleep due to the stressors of everyday life. Colleges alike do not prioritize sleep, nor do they provide educational sleep hygiene programs as to show its students just how crucial those eight hours can be. Because of this, students are struggling to maintain a healthy lifestyle. Sleep is just one of the basic building blocks that all humans need. Without it, not only will one’s mental health deteriorate but their physical health as well. Thus, in order for college students to be successful, they need sleep. So why aren’t colleges allowing their students this basic need?
According to Siegel (2005) sleep is a recurring period in human activity that is defined as a state of immobility with greatly reduced responsiveness, which can be distinguished from coma or anesthesia by its rapid reversibility (Barnes, Jiang & Lepak, 2016). Borbely and Achermann (1999) noted that a major process that underlies sleep regulation is the circadian process, a clocklike mechanism that is basically independent of prior sleep and waking and determines the alternation of periods with high and low sleep propensity. It is undisputed that sleep fulfills important functions, such as allowing physical repair processes or facilitating memory processes (Barnes, Jiang & Lepak, 2016). As noted by Sonnetag & Mojza (2008), sleep quantity entails the amount of time an individual spends in a sleeping state, and sleep quality refers to difficulty falling asleep, staying asleep, and the number of awakenings experienced throughout the night. Sleep is proposed to be an important part of the recovery process that restores energy levels needed for engagement at work (Ebert, Thiart,Berking, 2015).