I've just been reading some interesting studies on sleep deprivation in relation to children and the findings are astounding.
This is one of two posts. The first focuses on the brain and the second, on obesity.
Children - from elementary school through high school - are on average getting 1 hour less sleep today than they did 30 years ago and it's having its toll on their ability to do well in school but also potentially has much to do with the terrible teen syndrome.
Let's start by looking at the effect on children's ability. Dr. Avi Sadeh at Tel Aviv University did a test with 4th graders and 6th graders and found that by depriving the 6th graders of 1 hour's sleep per night for three nights, their performance level descended to a level of a normal 4th grader. In other words, a loss of one hour of sleep is equivalent to the loss of two years of cognitive maturation and development.
With the use of fMRI, Sadeh's findings can be further substantiated. Dr. Matthew Walker at UC Berkeley explains the neurobiological functioning based on sleep deprivation.
"Tired children can't remember what they just learned because neurons lose their plasticity, becoming incapable of forming new synaptic connections necessary to encode a memory." He goes on to explain "During sleep, the brain shifts what it learned that day to more efficient storage regions of the brain. Each stage of sleep plays it own unique role in capturing memories. For example studying a foreign language requires learning vocabulary, auditory memory of new sounds, and motor skills to correctly enunciate the new word. The vocabulary is synthesized by the hippocampus early in the night during 'slow-wave sleep,' a deep slumber without dreams. The motor skills of enunciation are processed during stage 2 non-REM sleep, and the auditory memories are encoded across all stages. Memories that are emotionally laden get processed during REM sleep. The more you learned during the day, the more you need to sleep that night.
"To reconsolidate these memories, certain genes appear to upregulate during sleep - they literally turn on, or get activated. One of these genes is essential for synaptic plasticity, the strengthening of neural connections. The brain does synthesize some memories during the day, but they're enhanced and concretized during the night - new inferences and associations are drawn, leading to insights the next day."
Being loose on the discipline around sleep is like being loose on the discipline around drugs and alcohol. All three are harmful. Not forcing your children to get enough sleep is equivalent to depriving them of learning. This will be a significant hurdle for them in their future growth and opportunities. According to a study from Rhode Island, 94% of high schoolers set their own bedtimes. Maybe this is not such a good idea.
Looking in to brain functioning further reveals another interesting fact. Have you found that when you lack sleep, you start to go in to a more negative space in your head? You start doubting and start getting in to a bad insecure space? OK, this might just be me but at least thanks to Dr. Walker I understand what's happening. Emotional context of a memory affects where it gets processed. Negative stimuli gets processed by the amygdala; positive or neutral memories gets processed by the hippocampus. Sleep deprivation hits the hippocampus harder than the amygdala. The result is that sleep-deprived people fail to recall pleasant memories, yet recall gloomy memories just fine.
In Dr. Walker's tests, he found that sleep deprived kids could remember 81% of the words with a negative connotation, like cancer. But they could remember only 31% of the words with a positive or neutral connotation like 'sunshine' or 'basket'.
What does this all mean? Kids apparently are over extended, which is depriving them of sleep. While they may touch more subjects, play more sports and experiment with more extra-curricula activities, their brains are not computing and therefore their cognitive abilities are not able to keep up. We are producing children of a lesser brain.
Oh and don't forget that second tidbit about negativity. While not proven as yet, there's a strong belief that sleep deprivation is causing children's moodiness, depression, and even binge eating. Forcing them to get more sleep may make for a more pleasant household.
Studies sourced: Avi Sadeh, Reut Gruber, and Amiram Raviv, "The Effects of sleep Restriction and Extension on School-Age Children: What a Difference an Hour Makes" Child Development, Vol. 74.
Walker, Matthew P., and Robert Stickgold, "Sleep-Dependant Learning and Memory Consolidation." Neuron, Vol. 44
Walker, Matthew P., and Robert Stickgold, "Sleep, Memory & Plasticity," Annual Review of Psychology, Vol. 57.
