The populations of hunter-gathers are enough hours of sleep than to us, perhaps because they enjoy greater regularity in the circadian rhythms.
In morning chatter in front of a coffee it is difficult to find someone who does not complain about the little sleep. We usually think that modern habits and the invasive presence of technology have shortened night rest: but is it really true? No, according to a study that has compared sleep in industrialized societies with that of contexts far from the agi and disorders of modern life. The populations of hunter-rackets sleep less than usbut they have more regular circadian rhythms.
Based on research, published on Proceedings of the Royal Society Bit would be precisely the poor regularity of the circadian rhythms (the cycles, over 24 hours, with which certain physiological processes are repeated) to make us perceive the hours of sleep that we sleep as little restful.
We don’t sleep less: we are less rested. It is used to take it for granted that the pervasiveness of the screens of computers, TV and cell phones has decreased the hours of sleep that we allow ourselves per night. But most of the studies that affirm it are based on individual assessments and not on more rigorous monitoring methods, such as wearable devices that detect physical activity or electrodes that record brain waves. Research built on more reliable measurements reveal that There has not been a decline in the duration of sleep in the last fifty years.
Short and lively nights. Having passed this type of studies had revealed surprisingly short and rich in interruptions) in the populations of modern hunters-cackers. For example, the San (once known as Boscani: a people who live in the desert region of Kalahari, between South Africa, Namibia and Botswana) sleep on average 6.7 hours per night; The Hadza of Tanzania 6.2 hours, the Bayaka, in the Central African Republic and in the Congo, 5.9 hours; And the Himba, a people of Nomad breeders of Namibia, 5.5 hours.
Rest in comparison. For the new work, Leela McKinnon and David Samson, of the University of Toronto Mississauga, they analyzed 54 sleep studies conducted in every part of the world, comparing the sleep habits of industrialized companies with those of small populations far from all inhabitants of the Amazon, Madagascar and the Pacific islands. In all, 866 people were involved: not a massive number, but it is The most representative champion So far in studies of this type.
Long and safe sleep. In general, the people involved in the study stood at 6.8 hours of sleep on average at night.
But In non -industrialized companies the average was 6.4 hours, against 7.1 of industrialized companies. So we sleep more, and in a “more efficient” way: we spend 88% of the time we spend in bed. For non -industrialized populations, actual sleep hours represent 74% of the time spent in bed.
For researchers, earnings in hours of sleep and efficiency depend on the Best security conditions of our nightsnot passed to avoid predators and rival populations.
Irregular rhythms. In return, though, We have lost regularity in the circadian rhythms: In industrialized companies, the index of circadian functionality, which evaluates the conditions of our internal clock, reaches a score of 0.63, against the average of 0.7 of non -industrialized ones.
We are less exposed to stimuli that regularize and protect the cyclical regularity of the physiological rhythms, such as daylight or low night temperatures. This could be the reason why we find sleep less restaurateureven if the study did not verify this hypothesis.
