February 23, 2010
Further evidence emerges that having a nap during the day improves your brainpower.
US boffins studied volunteers who slept for 90 minutes during the day and found they did better at cognitive tests than those who were kept awake.
Up until now, numerous pieces of research and experiments have suggested that having a quick siesta during the day can be beneficial. But an hour-and-a-half seems a bit excessive; that's not really a nap, is it? Guru can't imagine many HR departments sanctioning a post lunch 90 minute snooze for their workforce.
The latest study suggests that the brain may need sleep to process short-term memories, creating 'space' for new facts to be learned - basically clearing out the brain's inbox. And until that inbox is cleared out, you can't receive any more 'mail' and it will get bounced back.
Separate research last year also found that sleeping on a problem really can help solve it. Right, that's it - Guru is off to bedfordshire straight away and won't come back until all his problems have disappeared. That's a hell of a long nap...
US boffins studied volunteers who slept for 90 minutes during the day and found they did better at cognitive tests than those who were kept awake.
Up until now, numerous pieces of research and experiments have suggested that having a quick siesta during the day can be beneficial. But an hour-and-a-half seems a bit excessive; that's not really a nap, is it? Guru can't imagine many HR departments sanctioning a post lunch 90 minute snooze for their workforce.
The latest study suggests that the brain may need sleep to process short-term memories, creating 'space' for new facts to be learned - basically clearing out the brain's inbox. And until that inbox is cleared out, you can't receive any more 'mail' and it will get bounced back.
Separate research last year also found that sleeping on a problem really can help solve it. Right, that's it - Guru is off to bedfordshire straight away and won't come back until all his problems have disappeared. That's a hell of a long nap...
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