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Weekend ‘catch-up sleep’ is a lie

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Re: Weekend ‘catch-up sleep’ is a lie

#101

Post by alexpetralia »

sz4kerto wrote: post #88
kuu wrote: post #15

I think the research behind this news is quite weak: only 9 days and not that many participants (18 men and 18 women).

Please support your argument with numbers. 36 participants can be plenty or can be absolutely insignificant. My partner is just in the process of getting subjects for an experiment and she's trying to estimate the required number of participants. In their case 30 participants would make the experiment useless, 40-42 would make it very powerful (significant). You can't judge the weakness of an experiment just based on…

This is an important counterargument. Effect size absolutely matters.

Re: Weekend ‘catch-up sleep’ is a lie

#102

Post by svat »

freddie_mercury wrote: post #62
welly wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the actual evidence, for the OP, is that he/she feels better. I don't think it matters if no one else feels better. OP isn't making a scientific claim other than they feel better after a weekend of sleep.

I have a friend who deeply believes that he can drink unlimited amounts of beer and not get drunk. He will drive his car home after drinking 10 beers. Should his feelings count as evidence in any meaningful sense? Or do we generally assume that his feelings -- especially since they are contrary to science -- are not a good guide to what really happens?

Self-reported statements (about how someone feels) are good evidence for how they feel. In your example, if the claim is that your friend believes he is not drunk, then his experience still carries more weight (is a more reliable indicator of his beliefs) than most studies.

This is different from the question of whether he is actually sober, of course. But the post you're replying to is specifically about the claim that X person feels better, not about any physical effects on their body. I'd rather trust a person about how they say they feel (especially at a given moment), than studies trying to determine how most people probably feel or ought to feel in a similar situation.

Re: Weekend ‘catch-up sleep’ is a lie

#103

Post by sz4kerto »

c1as wrote: post #90
sz4kerto wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please support your argument with numbers. 36 participants can be plenty or can be absolutely insignificant. My partner is just in the process of getting subjects for an experiment and she's trying to estimate the required number of participants. In their case 30 participants would make the experiment useless, 40-42 would make it very powerful (significant). You can't judge the weakness of an experiment just based on…

Academia has had their chance. No one believes "studies" about personal life choices any more if the results conflict with each other every 5 years. It's just publication pressure (or worse, as other commenters have hinted at).

> Academia has had their chance.

You can't say that. (Ok, of course everyone has the right to her opinions.) The point of the scientific method is that it is, in many ways, self-correcting. It's getting addressed, albeit slowly. It will be counterproductive for all of us if we simply dismiss all results we're not comfortable with that it's only publication pressure.

I mean -- you can say that personally, and it probably makes sense, but as a society we need to get social sciences and medicine into a better shape instead of just 'letting it go'.

Re: Weekend ‘catch-up sleep’ is a lie

#104

Post by seanwilson »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #87
lm28469 wrote: post #85

Sleep is fun, people who regularly lack it will tell you they're "just fine" but they've been lacking sleep for so long that the baseline they're comparing themselves to is already skewed. Take two weeks off, avoid alcohol and other stimulant, avoid artificial light after 8 and wake up without an alarm. You'll see how you feel after that regimen. Your body knows exactly how much sleep it needs. But that's not compati…

> Take two weeks off, avoid alcohol and other stimulant, avoid artificial light after 8 and wake up without an alarm. You'll see how you feel after that regimen I do this once a year for one month for general health purposes. I am no less groggy in the morning. (No alarm means I wake up at 4AM or after 11 hours.) I am no more energetic. I sleep about the same number of hours as I did otherwise. Generally speaking, I…

> I am no less groggy in the morning. (No alarm means I wake up at 4AM or after 11 hours.) I am no more energetic. I sleep about the same number of hours as I did otherwise. Generally speaking, I noticed no physiological changes other than (a) craving sugar and (b) losing weight (due to cutting out alcohol and related foods).

For what it's worth, I have the same anecdote. I don't see any dramatic difference. Same with avoiding caffeine and I normally drink a lot of tea and coffee.

Re: Weekend ‘catch-up sleep’ is a lie

#105

Post by mruts »

lm28469 wrote: post #85

Sleep is fun, people who regularly lack it will tell you they're "just fine" but they've been lacking sleep for so long that the baseline they're comparing themselves to is already skewed. Take two weeks off, avoid alcohol and other stimulant, avoid artificial light after 8 and wake up without an alarm. You'll see how you feel after that regimen. Your body knows exactly how much sleep it needs. But that's not compati…

I dunno, maybe I’m weird, but without an alarm I can sleep 12 hours. And when I do, I feel like total shit: very tired, groggy, and a little depressed.

If I sleep 5-7 hours on the otherhand, I feel much better.

Re: Weekend ‘catch-up sleep’ is a lie

#106

Post by fratlas »

mruts wrote: post #105
lm28469 wrote: post #85

Sleep is fun, people who regularly lack it will tell you they're "just fine" but they've been lacking sleep for so long that the baseline they're comparing themselves to is already skewed. Take two weeks off, avoid alcohol and other stimulant, avoid artificial light after 8 and wake up without an alarm. You'll see how you feel after that regimen. Your body knows exactly how much sleep it needs. But that's not compati…

I dunno, maybe I’m weird, but without an alarm I can sleep 12 hours. And when I do, I feel like total shit: very tired, groggy, and a little depressed. If I sleep 5-7 hours on the otherhand, I feel much better.

Has anyone managed to break out of this? I've tried increasing exercise, waking up with sunlight; nothing works

Re: Weekend ‘catch-up sleep’ is a lie

#107

Post by softwaredoug »

sebslomski wrote: post #20

I highly recommend reading Matthew Walker‘s Why We Sleep [0] where stuff like the above mentioned is summed up. Great read! [0] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34466963

I like this book, but not a lot of practica advice. A good compendium is The Sleep Solution by Chris Winter.

Re: Weekend ‘catch-up sleep’ is a lie

#108

Post by [deleted] »

sz4kerto wrote: post #88
kuu wrote: post #15

I think the research behind this news is quite weak: only 9 days and not that many participants (18 men and 18 women).

Please support your argument with numbers. 36 participants can be plenty or can be absolutely insignificant. My partner is just in the process of getting subjects for an experiment and she's trying to estimate the required number of participants. In their case 30 participants would make the experiment useless, 40-42 would make it very powerful (significant). You can't judge the weakness of an experiment just based on…

[deleted]

Re: Weekend ‘catch-up sleep’ is a lie

#109

Post by khalilravanna »

lm28469 wrote: post #85

Sleep is fun, people who regularly lack it will tell you they're "just fine" but they've been lacking sleep for so long that the baseline they're comparing themselves to is already skewed. Take two weeks off, avoid alcohol and other stimulant, avoid artificial light after 8 and wake up without an alarm. You'll see how you feel after that regimen. Your body knows exactly how much sleep it needs. But that's not compati…

I’ve been doing this for years and it’s wonderful. On the few days I need an alarm (someone schedules something early) I’m usually groggy and in a poor mood. The difference in mood and grogginess is so drastic I can tell when I’m getting sick a week or so before symptoms appear because I’ll wake up an hour late and still feel terrible. It’s eerie how accurate your body can signal things to you when left to its own devices.

As far as the “work hard, play hard” mentality, I’ve chosen to work at startups/companies where I can come into the office flexibly (usually around 10) and it’s worked great.

One final note: I wonder if the rampant depression and suicidal thoughts I had as a teenager, that are now entirely gone, were a product of the fact that I was forced to wake up every day at 6 AM to an alarm. I was such an anti-social, depressed creep it’s terrifying to think we continually subject our children to this sleep-deprivating schedule.

Re: Weekend ‘catch-up sleep’ is a lie

#110

Post by SCdF »

lm28469 wrote: post #85

Sleep is fun, people who regularly lack it will tell you they're "just fine" but they've been lacking sleep for so long that the baseline they're comparing themselves to is already skewed. Take two weeks off, avoid alcohol and other stimulant, avoid artificial light after 8 and wake up without an alarm. You'll see how you feel after that regimen. Your body knows exactly how much sleep it needs. But that's not compati…

I have found that if I just let my body sleep as much as it wants to I sleep 9-10hrs and I feel groggy and hung over (presumably dehydrated) for a long time after I wake up. I have tried dropping stimulants, all that kind of thing, and have tried it for weeks. It does not right itself.

What has worked the best for me is having an alarm for 7am, 6-7 days as week. If I am having heaps of trouble sleeping I'll disable it and maybe sleep 1hr more, but in general I keep is consistent, and when I wake up it takes me a much shorter time to feel human again.

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