Outline and evaluate the restoration explanation for sleep. (8+16)m

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  • Created by: Amira
  • Created on: 02-02-14 15:36

Outline and evaluate the restoration explanation for sleep. (8+16)m


 
 

Sleep is divided into several different stages- slow wave sleep which is associated with body repair and rapid eye movement sleep which is associated with brain recovery. This theory is proposed by Oswald.


 

Growth hormone is secreted during SWS. This hormone stimulates growth, and is therefore important for protein synthesis and cell growth. GH is secreted in pulses through the day, but a significant amount is released during the night and during SWS.


 

Gessin et al found that when a person’s sleep-wake cycles are reversed by twelve hours, the released of GH is reversed. This shows that the neural mechanisms of GH is related to SWS. Also there is a correlation found between amount of SWS and GH hormones (Van cauter and Plat). The decline of GH in elderly has been associated with less SWS.


 

The lack of GH, released has been associated with a reduced function of the immune system (Krueger et al). The immune system produces antibodies, which is generated during cell growth and protein synthesis during SWS.


 

However, a case study of Peter Dripp, American DJ, who decided to stay awake for a total of 201 hours. He began to hallucinate after five days (seeing spiders in his shoes) and became paranoid for example he thought that people were drugging his food. After three days he became abusive and ill tempered. Throughout the experiment, Tripp showed a continuous decline in body temperature and by the of the experiment his wake brain wave patterns were indistinguishable from a sleeping person. After 24 hours of sleep, he reported feeling perfectly normal, but this could have been social desirability bias as he may have wanted to simply return to work.  


 

This study showed that lack of sleep doesn’t necessarily mean long term damage and there is no need to recover anything from the amount of sleep that

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