+
upworthy
Health

Sleep deprivation is hurting kids in more ways than you think.

It might sound funny in hindsight, but these effects of sleep deprivation are seen all too often in schools all over the world.

sleep studies, depression, teacher, student,  mental health

Are kids getting the required amount of daily sleep?

True
Westin Thread Forward

Imagine you're in your school math class after staying up late doing homework, and the teacher calls on you to explain something complicated on the board.

Ah, there's that palm sweat everyone who's been through this is painfully familiar with.

As if woken abruptly from a dream — which, let's face it, might've been the case — you look up sheepishly at the teacher, then around at everyone else staring back at you. You squint desperately at the equation on the board, but it might as well be in some language you don't know. Maybe you try to answer it and make no sense or just sink in your seat and say, "I don't know." Either way, aside from feeling like a zombie, you're also probably left feeling pretty embarrassed.

It might sound funny in hindsight, but these effects of sleep deprivation are seen all too often in schools all over the world.

According to the National Sleep Foundation, 31% of kids aged 6 to 11 in America get eight hours of sleep or less on a weeknight. The recommended amount for their demographic is at least 9 hours. And the stats only get more troubling as kids get older. According to a study at San Diego State, 40% of teens actually get seven hours of sleep a night or less, and that percentage has risen dramatically in the last 10 years.

Obviously, regular sleep deprivation can negatively affect the body and mind of an adult, but it can be detrimental to a young person.

stress, studies, children, education, environment

A lack of sleep can cause an inability to regulate mood and emotions.

Photo by Henrikke Due on Unsplash

That goes double for a young person from a low-income household. Just ask Reut Gruber, associate professor of psychiatry at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. Apart from being an expert in the genetics of sleep, she's a member of the World Sleep Society and focuses on how sleep deprivation impacts children's day-to-day lives.

Just like adults, children’s ability to get through the day is compromised when they don't get enough sleep, but in order to understand why that happens, we have to look at how the brain works.

"There are several parts of the brain that are dependent on sleep to finish their business," Gruber explains. "One part of the brain that's key is the prefrontal cortex. It's kind of like the engine, the machine that underlies executive function."

Everything we do throughout our day — planning, ignoring distractions, making decisions, setting goals, etc. — rely on the prefrontal cortex working efficiently. Unfortunately that's also one of the areas of the brain that's most sensitive to sleep deprivation.

When the prefrontal cortex is compromised by a lack of sleep, all the functions it oversees are affected. This includes our ability to regulate mood and emotions.

You know how moody you get when you're running on less sleep? Imagine that feeling as a kid exacerbated by school assignments, teachers, and your classmates pushing your buttons.

Now imagine you return home after a day of feeling sleep deprived to a cramped house where there's no structure and four kids sleeping in one room. Perhaps you live in a neighborhood where every few hours you're awoken by what might be gunshots outside. According to Gruber, these scenarios are all too common.

Can you see a vicious cycle developing?

While research on the relationship between socioeconomic status and sleep deprivation is limited, there have been studies that have found a correlation between children from lower-income households and more disrupted sleep. It makes sense when you consider the scenario above — if life at home is stressed by a lack of money, food, or safety, it's not surprising sleep patterns would be disrupted.

And when sleep deprivation is the norm for kids, they get used to functioning at lower levels, which in turn may affect their academic success and ability to regulate their emotions.

poverty, community, education, sleep deprivation

Stress at home can disrupt sleeping patterns.

Photo via Pixabay.

Gruber says a good way to do this is set a hard stop for kids in terms of evening work/play/social media time. Once their sleep time comes around, encourage them to put it all away, literally and metaphorically. It might be hard at first, but the benefits will pay off tenfold.

"Make a commitment to making a change [to your child's sleep routine]," Gruber says. "Once you do it, you feel so good, you don't want to go back."

True

As AI makes daily headlines (and robots take over), I’ve been thinking more about the future of human work and the value of craftsmanship. Craftsmanship, the human trait that enables us to care for and love the work we produce, especially in the built environment.

Even as we make advancements and increase efficiencies in technology, the built world desperately needs more people who care about craft and want to work with their hands.

In construction specifically, the demand for housing—especially affordable housing—and safer roads and bridges is only increasing. And over 40% of skilled workers will retire in the next 10 years. We need new craftspeople more than ever. And, fast.
That’s why we started MT Copeland: to capture the craftsmanship seen in the built world around us (our homes, our workplaces, our cities), and help anyone learn directly from experienced professionals. We help craftspeople teach the skills they use on the job every day, and inspire others to make a career move into skilled careers. Carpenters, entrepreneurs building homes, painters, and even first-time homeowners can now use methods from generations past to make projects better.

The attention to detail in drywall, painting, or cabinet making requires a unique combination of technical prowess, problem-solving abilities, and an artistic eye. It’s the kind of work made only possible by human touch. Just when it starts to feel like everything’s destined to be automated, remember: some things simply must be made by human hands.

Keep ReadingShow less
Carsten Vollrath/Canva

Imagine watching your four-tier wedding cake hitting the ground before you even get a bite.

It's quite common for people to fantasize about their wedding day—the ceremony, the bridal party, the dress, the cake—and some people spend months or even years meticulously planning every detail. People even spend thousands of dollars hiring wedding planners to make sure that the big day stays fully organized and all the moving parts come together without a hitch.

But no matter how well you plan, sometimes things that simply can't be predicted happen. And how you and your beloved handle the hitches and glitches on your wedding day can say a lot.

Especially when that hitch or glitch is something major…like watching the beautiful, four-tier wedding cake—the one you spent time choosing and lots of money creating to share with your wedding guests—come crashing to the ground right in front of you.

Keep ReadingShow less
Pop Culture

A very pregnant Jessie J invited all her pregnant fans to the front row and fed them snacks

"I used to be a fan of her now I am a whole air conditioner 😍😍😍."

Jessie J bonded with her pregnant fans at a concert in the spring of 2023.

If you've ever been pregnant, you know that after a certain point, nothing is comfortable. Growing an entire human being inside your own body is no small feat, and between the weight of your belly, your hormones haphazardly ricocheting all over the place, the ravenous hunger that comes out of nowhere and a host of WFT-I-didn't-know-this-could-happen-with-pregnancy surprises, it's a lot.

So going to a concert pregnant is a big commitment, which singer Jessie J understands because she herself was seven months pregnant when she gave a live concert. A viral video shared by @mafaldamcruz on TikTok shows the pop star sitting on a stool on stage during a concert in the spring of 2023. She was chatting with the audience when she spotted a fellow pregnant woman in the crowd.

"You're pregnant, too?" she asked the audience member. "Do you want to sit down?"

She asked how far along the concertgoer was, and while we can't hear the answer, they must've been pretty far long because Jessie J responded, "Oh, sh_t. Come sit here," while pointing to an area in front of the stage.

Keep ReadingShow less

Author, educator and mother Esther Wojcicki.

Esther Wojcicki has earned the right to tell people how to raise their kids. She’s an educator, journalist and bestselling author of "How to Raise Successful People" who has raised three daughters—two are CEOs and the other a doctor.

Susan Wojcicki is the CEO of YouTube, Anne Wojcicki is the co-founder and CEO of 23andMe and Dr. Janet Wojcicki is an anthropologist and epidemiologist who works on HIV progression and obesity risk in children.

In "How to Raise Successful People" Esther Wojcicki says the secret to success is the result of “TRICK”: trust, respect, independence, collaboration and kindness. In a new article she wrote for NBC Chicago, she boiled that down to one rule, “Don't do anything for your kids that they can do for themselves.”

Keep ReadingShow less
Pop Culture

Husband asks if he was wrong for not defending wife during armed robbery

Everyone always assumes what they'll do, but this guy unfortunately found out.

A wife is upset that her husband didn't defend her during an armed robbery.

One thing humans are really good at is hearing about a tragic situation and telling others how they would've handled it differently, which presumably would've resulted in a better outcome. But the thing is, no one actually knows how they'll respond to a terrifying situation until they go through it. Even those with specialized training don't know how they'll respond until the thing they've been training for is unfolding in front of them.

This is why we see stories of police officers mistaking a cell phone for a gun or not immediately entering a building to stop a gunman. So it's interesting that people think they'll make just the right decision in a traumatic situation as an everyday citizen. Trauma does weird things to your brain in the moment, and oftentimes we aren't in control of what our brains decide to do.

But one man on Reddit says his wife believes he should've been able to override his trauma response to "defend" her during an armed robbery. Overwhelmingly, his AITA thread is proving that he is indeed not the bad guy in this situation.

Keep ReadingShow less

The difference between men and women on dating apps is significant.

Dating apps are challenging for the average guy because they can be a big blow to their self-esteem. They can contribute to feelings of anxiety and depression because of the heightened competition on the apps and the pressure to present a perfect image.

A study out of the University of North Texas found that male Tinder users reported lower levels of satisfaction with their faces and bodies and lower levels of self-worth than those who aren't on the dating app.

Keep ReadingShow less
via Tod Perry/Facebook and Ron Lach/Pexels

An "excessive" Facebook post

Have you ever seen a post by some guy on Facebook with a photo of his significant other and a message that says, “She is my rock. I could never live without her," or something similar? Did it make you think that the couple was doing well or that he just messed up and needed a little external validation?

If you were skeptical and thought that the relationship might be in trouble, you’re probably right.

A survey of 2,000 British people ages 18 to 50 by Shotkit found a dramatic difference in relationship happiness between people who post a lot of couples' content and those who “never” share any.

Of those who share excessively (three or more times a week), only 10% report being “very happy” in their relationships, and 42% say they are “very unhappy”—as opposed to those who “never” share couples' content, of which 46% are “very happy,” and 13% are “very unhappy.”

Keep ReadingShow less