Lack of sleep hurts many cognitive processes such as attention, alertness, concentration, reasoning and problem solving. Sleep also helps to ‘consolidate’ memories in your mind. This is according to mybedframes.co.uk . Find out other interesting facts about sleep.

#According to a research carried out on sleep, short sleep (6 hours or less) is associated with 12% increased risk of death. Long sleep is associated with 30% increased risk of death.

#The people in our dreams are not made up. We have seen hundreds of thousands of faces throughout our lives, and we only see faces that we have seen before in real life.

#The brain is very much active during sleep. Your brain will consolidate all that you learnt that day, helping cement it into long term memory.

#Researchers have found that it can take five minutes longer to fall asleep and that you sleep for 20 minutes less when there is a full moon.

#Humans sleep on average around three hours less than other primates like chimps, rhesus monkeys, squirrel monkeys and baboons, all of whom sleep for 10 hours.

#Sleepiness during the day after a good night’s sleep could be the underlying reason to a serious medical condition or sleep disorder. These problems should be discussed with a physician.

#It was once thought that we only dreamt during Rapid Eye Movement sleep. However it’s possible there may not be a single moment of our sleep when we are actually dreamless.

#You cannot bank sleep in advance. To stay at the top of your game, keep to a regular sleeping pattern.

#The scientific record for the longest period without sleep is 11 days.

#Playing sounds quietly at night such as a lecture recording or a piano melody can help you remember it.

#Eating cheese before bed does not gives you nightmares. This is according to ‘The British Cheese Board’, the essential amino acid in milk helps normalize people’s sleeping patterns and reduce stress levels. But it does appear that eating cheese can increase dream intensity which helps us remember them more.

#Oversleeping  during weekends can upset your sleeping pattern which can make it even harder to get a refreshing sleep, according to Harvard Sleep Expert Robert Stickgold, Ph. D.

#Sleeping on your back will decrease the likely hood of getting wrinkles at an earlier age.

#Lack of sleep decreases a person’s sex drive as sleeplessness depletes one’s energy levels, encourages sleepiness and increased tension which have everything to blame for lower libido.

 

#Sleeping for too long increases your risk of diabetes. Indulging in too much sleep can negatively disrupt the body’s ability to use insulin, which will increase the risk of diabetes later on in life.

#Getting more sleep, by itself, will not lead to any weight gain. But staying awake longer generally means people will eat more than is required.

#Any alcohol within three hours of bedtime can disrupt REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, so you never get into the deepest sleep possible which is the critical sleep. Although drinking alcohol may make you tired and help you to fall asleep quicker, alcohol in your system while asleep will disrupt your sleep leaving your feeling tired after a nights sleep.

#Cramming the night before a test is a useful exercise. NOT! It’s during REM sleep when we consolidate all our memories. Pulling an all-nighter before a big test may force your memory to fail you when you need it most.

#In 1998, scientists seemingly showed that shining a bright light on the back of a person’s knee could reset their biological clock. Scientists saw a correlation between shining a bright light on back of human knees and the reduction in fatigue. It has been said that experts even looked at the possibility of airline passengers wearing a knee brace with a light source which could reset their body clock as they slept.