Taking naps boosts memory and creativity | Hacker News Reader

Taking naps boosts memory and creativity

theglobeandmail.com

43 pointsgruseom21 comments

It's a shame naps aren't commonly seen as a productivity enhancer (here in the US, anyway) - there have been quite a few days where just a 20 minute nap would probably have helped me focus for the rest of the afternoon.

I totally agree. It's been a fantasy of mine for years to have a company where there are a couple of beautiful quiet rooms with an armchair and some sort of couch or cot. You could reserve them for a half hour to think or sleep. I know for sure that this would enhance my productivity, and probably others' as well.

I've always believed in the power of a nap when you start losing focus or are stumped on a particular problem. I've put a futon in my office for that exact purpose.

Agreed - I have a small couch in my office that I use for naps; Sometimes in the early afternoon, I lose motivation and hit the proverbial 'wall' - when this happens, I just set my cell phone alarm and nap for an hour.

I usually wake up alert and refreshed and try to make up for the lost time. As an aside, I once forgot to set my alarm and ended up sleeping for about 3 hours. My colleague thought I had left for the day :)

If I didn't get enough sleep the previous night and I have a sufficiently large lunch, then it would seem inevitable I would dose off :))) even if I'm in a meeting @_@

I try to take 3 naps + per week. I'm a big fan of the caffeine nap for the extra long days:

http://lifehacker.com/software/sleep/take-a-caffeine-nap-154...

That's very interesting. What makes you a big fan? What effects do you observe? How does it compare to drinking coffee and not sleeping, or not drinking coffee and sleeping?

Not the parent, but I often take caffeine naps as well and they're great. For me they're always accompanied by an awesome action-packed nap dream and I wake up extremely refreshed.

Mine are a lot longer than 15 minutes, though -- usually 1.5 to 2 hours.

What I've read for years, and experienced myself, is that a 20- to 30-minute nap is refreshing, while a longer nap (1-2 hours) will make you feel fairly sludgy for a while after you wake up.

It all depends on when you wake up in your sleep cycle.

20 minutes is usually that period where you get max rest before entering deeper sleep. The average full sleep cycle is about 90 minutes, so at that point you're usually in light sleep mode again.

After a 15-30 minute caffeine nap I feel more motivated and efficient. If on a given day I'm in a rut or the words/work aren't flowing, I'll almost always take a quick nap & snap out of it.

My personal experience with coffee is that it ruins my appetite and sometimes gives a caffeine hangover (though it's minor). When I take it with a nap this doesn't happen.

Also, I almost always try to take a nap with a problem or idea in my head. I usually wake up with new thoughts on it.

I'm not sure I could force myself to fall asleep after drinking some caffeine, especially when I have a kitchen timer staring my in the face with 15 minutes left on it.

Caffeine takes 15 minutes to kick in. So it won't disturb your nap. Down an espresso shot before your nap and you will wake up in 15 minutes without a kitchen timer and you will be very alert too.

While it may take fifteen minutes to kick in, for many people it has very strong associations with waking up. For somebody who habitually drinks coffee in the morning, even decaf may make them more alert for a few minutes by placebo. (I'm more of a tea drinker, and find hot herbal teas can have the same focusing effect.)

Also, if people usually drink their stimulant sweet, that's another confounding variable.

Caffeinated energy drink?

Likewise, if you usually drink those, you probably associate those with trying to be more awake as well.

(I'm assuming that's what you meant.)

No, I meant as a change from coffee so he wouldn't have the association.

> very strong associations with waking up

Which is why I said espresso shot, which you can throw in without much time for "ooh I am drinking coffee" thoughts.

Just a nitpick: caffeine doesn't clear your system of adenosine, it plugs its receptors without activating them, effectively crowding it out.

Your brain, with its countless centuries of evolution, quickly catches on to these shenanigans. After a few days of caffeine use, it will adapt by growing more adenosine receptors -- either you continue plugging those, too, or you face the avalanche of adenosine when you quit: headaches and unshakable drowiness.

Anecdotally, small amounts of caffeine regularly throughout the day (e.g. thermos of green tea or caffeinated mints) seem less likely to trigger this, but I'm curious how low the threshold actually is.

Is it just me, or have a lot of pro-napping stories been making the rounds for the past two weeks?

"When in doubt get horizontal"

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