A Nap a Day May Keep the Doctor Away : Lifestyles: Although it runs counter to the U.S. work ethic, some researchers believe adults should sleep briefly during the day.
Get caught napping on the job these days and you could be out looking for another one. But in the workplace of the future, you might be able to snooze your way to the top.
“I try to take a nap just about every day,” says Gerald Celente, director of the Socio-Economic Research Institute in Rhinebeck, N.Y., a consulting firm that works with corporate clients to predict business and social trends that may affect them. Celente, who tries to crash for about half an hour each afternoon between 1:30 and 3:30, also tries to sell clients and his own employees on the restorative power of napping.
“I think every culture used to nap before the Industrial Revolution hit full force,” he says. Now, as the dominance of heavy industry wanes, he suggests that businesses pay closer attention to the rhythms of human life and less attention to the time clock.
Experts on sleep and attentiveness agree that an afternoon nap can refresh a normal, healthy worker--especially someone with a stressful job.
“I find an occasional afternoon nap refreshes me,” says psychologist Harry Fiss, a sleep researcher at the University of Connecticut Health Center in Farmington.
“Some cultures build this into their daily schedules,” he says, referring to the mid-afternoon siesta of rural Mexico.
Some researchers go further. They suggest that allowing workers to nap would eliminate the unproductive and error-prone periods during the workday and sharpen work performance at other times, increasing worker creativity and productivity. The key, they say, is following natural cycles of sleeping and wakefulness.
The science of chronobiology has found various rhythms and cycles that our bodies follow.
These include infradian cycles (from the Latin infra for longer than and dies for day), such as the monthly menstrual cycle; circadian cycles ( circa , about; dies , day), a daily cycle that includes sleep and wakefulness, fluctuations in body temperature and the secretion of hormones; and ultradian cycles, ( ultra, beyond; dies, day), cycles of alertness that occur many times a day.
These should not be confused with so-called biorhythms, which some claim are cycles that can be computed on the basis of an individual’s birthday. Most scientists reject the biorhythms theory.
Canadian writer Lydia Dotto, whose book “Losing Sleep” is a compilation of recent sleep research, notes that the circadian cycle of sleep and wakefulness draws us into sleep twice a day--in the middle of the night and in the middle of the afternoon.
Most of us are asleep in the middle of the night. Dotto reports that many studies show that industrial and transportation accidents peak during the two “circadian troughs.”
And although most of us may feel that our mid-afternoon doldrums are caused by a heavy lunch, it appears to occur with or without a heavy meal and regardless of how much sleep we’ve had the night before.
“We have this sort of roller-coaster ride of alertness in the middle of the morning and the middle of the afternoon,” says Lotto, who lives in Peterborough, Ontario, and takes a two-hour nap each afternoon.
“Most people are aware of the fact that they get a little sleepy after lunch. That is a natural low point in alertness. Scientists suggest that we are natural nappers. That’s what our sleep system wants us to do,” she says.
California psychologist Ernest Lawrence Rossi, author of “The 20 Minute Break,” has focused on ultradian rhythms, which occur every 90 minutes. His thesis is that 20-minute breaks every 1 1/2 hours will improve work performance, mood and physical well-being.
But getting your boss used to the idea of an afternoon nap isn’t going to be easy. Studies of high-stress jobs with long hours are beginning to support the notion that work hours should be interspersed with rest periods.
A 1990 study by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration recommended that U.S. pilots on long-haul international flights get limited rest in the cockpit so they would be more alert for critical moments, like those during takeoffs and landings.
Several studies show that naps as short at 10 minutes can be restful and that if they’re less than two hours, they won’t interfere with nighttime sleep. But napping, like sleeping, varies with each individual.
As we get older, our circadian cycles break down, and as we find it harder to get deep sleep at night, we may need to nap more during the day.
Dotto says employers have a hard time distinguishing between napping at the workplace and sleeping on the job. Workplace-sanctioned napping, she says, would prevent on-the-job snoring.
On the vanguard of this trend is Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream in Waterbury, Vt. At the company’s central support office--where the white-collar types work--there is a “futon room,” equipped with a single futon, a Japanese-style mattress filled with cotton batting.
“They (employees) have used the room to take a quick nap,” says Rob Michalak, a company spokesman. “It’s perfectly accepted.”
There is, however, little evidence to suggest that many companies, even those with reputations for progressive workplace practices, are warming to the nap.
At places like Nike in Beaverton, Ore., you can ride your bike, run or use the weight room during the work day, but you can’t sleep, says spokesman Dusty Kidd. Ditto for Stride-Rite Corp. in Cambridge, Mass.
But Rossi realizes that recommending relaxing breaks on the job contradicts the American work ethic.
“It’s got to change,” he says. “It’s not how hard you work; it’s how smart you work.”
