{♫Intro♫}
Study after study has shown that napping is awesome
—even for young, healthy adults who
get enough sleep at night.
On average, people feel better after catching
a few Zs, and their brains work better too.
Which might make you wonder:
should everyone be napping?
Well, not necessarily.
The answer is more complicated than you might think.
Lots of people swear by naps.
In the US, for example, about half of adults
nap in a given week.
And there’s been a ton of research on napping
which suggests the benefits are impressive.
Post-nap, people do better on tests that measure
math skills, logic, reaction time, memory,
mood… all kinds of things, really.
And on some tests, a nap
is even better than caffeine!
But such results are a bit biased,
because a lot of this work has been done in people
who are either sleep deprived or habitual nappers.
And studies suggest the gains for people
who nap regularly are so great that
even if a study includes non-nappers,
the nappers’ benefits can skew the results
of the whole group!
Now, it makes sense that researchers have
relied so heavily on nappers
and people who are downright exhausted.
It’s not exactly easy to fall asleep in the middle of the day
in a weird lab bedroom
with wires attached to you.
But, it also means we’re only now starting
to figure out who benefits from napping and why.
And while naps are great on average,
not everyone benefits equally.
When researchers have taken pains to look
at a more representative sample, they’ve
been able to tease out some differences between
people who nap regularly and those who don’t.
Non-nappers typically don’t get a cognitive boost
from napping; lots of times, they just
wake up feeling groggy.
And it may be because there are differences
in what happens in their brains
when they nap.
Non-nappers spend more time in deeper sleep,
which could make it harder for them to wake up.
They also have fewer brain-wave signatures
of memory consolidation—when new information
moves into long-term storage—
which could explain why they don’t perform better
on memory tests post-nap.
But what if non-nappers just need
more practice napping?
Researchers looked into that question
for a study published in 2018.
They put non-habitual nappers
on a training regimen to try to build their napping skills.
Basically, participants took a 20-minute nap,
3 times a week.
And, after 4 weeks... it made zero difference.
They still had the same patterns of brainwaves
during a nap, they woke up feeling
just as groggy, and they did no better
on cognitive tests.
That could be because nap aversion is hard-wired.
There’s some evidence that it may come down
to the gene variations that you’re born with
and your childhood napping habits.
Non-nappers could just be people who have
learned through experience that napping doesn’t
work for them.
Or, it could be that the participants simply didn’t train long or hard enough.
But even if everyone could learn to
nap like the pros,
there are a few other caveats to consider
before we say they should.
For shift workers and people with sleep disorders
or atypical sleep schedules, things get even
more complicated.
And even though older adults
are more likely to take naps than younger folks,
napping in seniors is associated with higher rates
of some pretty nasty health outcomes.
There’s no direct evidence that napping is causing these problems.
But we need more information about this connection
before we can say napping is great
for this group.
Still, if you are a younger, healthy adult who enjoys a good siesta,
you’ll probably get a lot out of napping regularly.
And there’s plenty of science
that can help you optimize your routine.
Research says the sweet spot for nap length
is somewhere around 10 to 30 minutes.
Anything shorter is not restful.
Much longer than that, and you’ll wake up groggy.
And the best time of day to nap seems to be
sometime in the 2 to 5 PM window.
This could be because circadian rhythms naturally
dip in the afternoon —
hence that mid-afternoon lull.
And that may make it easier to fall asleep,
which is definitely an important factor in
napping success.
But there’s also evidence that late-day
naps interfere with nighttime sleep,
so it may just be that 2 to 5 is early enough
to avoid that.
So even if you usually avoid naps,
you could try following these best practices and see
if napping does anything for you.
But if it doesn’t work out,
you don’t need to feel bad.
Your brain might just work a little differently.
Thanks to Rox Manzi for asking,
and to all our other patrons who voted for this question
in our poll.
You can find out more about joining our Patreon community
at Patreon.com/SciShow.
And one more quick tip:
you might get the most benefits of all
if you combine your nap with caffeine.
We have a whole episode
that explains why and how to pull it off—
so why not watch that one next!
{♫Outro♫}