Instant Genius - How to get a good night’s sleep - Alice Gregory

Episode Date: October 24, 2018

Sleep psychologist Prof Alice Gregory on the science behind a satisfying slumber Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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You're listening to the Science Focus podcast from the BBC Focus magazine team. We're the UK's best-selling science and technology monthly, available in print and in several digital formats throughout the world. Find out more at ScienceFocus.com or look out for us in your app store. Hello and welcome to the Science Focus podcast. I'm Alice Lipscomb Southwell, the production editor of BBC Focus magazine. With the clocks turning back this week, now is a good time to think about sleep. We spend a third of our lives doing it, and it's a behaviour we share with every animal on earth.

But for such a ubiquitous activity, a good night slumber can be surprisingly difficult to achieve. Professor Alice Gregory is a sleep psychologist and author of the book, Notting Off, The Science of Sleep from cradle to grave. She spent her career attempting to understand why so many of us suffer when the lights go out. In this week's podcast, she speaks to staff writer and long-suffering insomniac, James Lloyd, about the importance of sleep, the realities of insomnia, and what we can do to maximise our chances of a good night's rest. Before we begin, please note that this podcast is not intended as a replacement for medical advice.

If you think you're suffering from a sleep disorder, then please contact your GP. So Alice, you're an expert in the science of sleep. I was wondering what first got you interested in studying sleep. That's a great question. I can remember, in fact, the exact moment that I became interested in this topic. And I was an undergraduate student. I was in the third year of my undergraduate degree on psychology. And we had a new lecturer. And it was fascinating because I'd learned so much about psychology, the science of mind and behavior. learned about, all the things that students usually learn about, developmental psychology, social psychology, psychology, memory learning perception, various other topics as well. But nobody had ever really mentioned sleep or focused on sleep. And the new lecturer focused, that was her area of research.

So she argued really well that really to understand our lives, or the waking part of our lives, it would be important not to ignore sleep. And then, so you've got a new book out, which is nodding off. Why did you decide to write this book? Yeah, that's interesting. So I've been interested in sleep research for so many years now. And I, of course, think it's fascinating. I spent my life thinking about sleep and researching it in relation to different things. And I think like many academics I always had in the back of my mind that it might be nice to write a book. but I think probably to be honest years ago I used to think I don't know if anyone would be interested in reading it so if you speak to let's say a child an average I don't know I've got an eight year old and a five year old so an average child were around their age

if you ask them to think about the most boring thing they can and it would I wouldn't be surprised if they came up with sleep So I did appreciate that not everyone found it as fascinating as I did. But then I had a baby and all the new parents that I met were fascinated by sleep. And I think as well, even though I've been researching a long time, I'd never really had firsthand sleep deprivation of the type I had when my first child was born. So I thought it might be a good time to sort of share some of the information I'd learned over the years. I don't just focus on children's sleep. I think I spoke to a publisher of fact and he said that's great,

but why don't you extend that to look at across the life force? Okay, so the theme of this podcast is how to get a good night's sleep. But before we go on to talk about that, I thought it would be a good idea to remind ourselves of why sleep is such an important thing in the first place. So what kind of effects does a bad night's sleep have on us? Yeah, well, I think we are learning. the time about the importance of sleep.

People often talk about the fact that researchers don't agree on the functions of sleep. But actually, I think that we all pretty much agree that it's important. And we're finding out all the time what it's important for. So there was a study a few years back looking at how sleep can help with removing toxins from the brain that may build up during the day. we know that sleep's important for learning and memory, the functioning of the immune system. There's literature looking at sleep in relation to weight. And there's all kinds of studies that's even been found that if you sleep, get enough sleep,

then you're more likely to look your best. So it seems to be related to so much of our waking lives. So beauty sleep is kind of true. Exactly. In fact, it was either the type of. of the paper or one of the media articles written about it. So yeah, there was a headline. I think it was something like, you know, there is some truth to beauty sleep. And of course there are links to mental health as well, aren't there? Bad sleep is linked to bad mental health too,

as well as physical health. Yeah. And there have been some really important studies recently showing that by improving sleep or giving people help for their sleep, actually appears to have positive effects for different aspects of psychological well-being as well, which is really exciting because it provides the potential opportunity to support people's mental health by improving their sleep. Okay. So going on to bad sleep then, I myself am quite a bad sleeper. I've always had problems with sleep, but recently it's kind of almost tipped the balance into going into kind of full-on insomnia. So I was wondering, when does a sleep problem become insomnia? What is the definition of insomnia. Yeah, that's another good question and sorry to hear about your sleep.

So I think many of us certainly I have experienced bad nights of sleep. You know, that's something that a lot, many people do experience. But when it becomes a clinically significant problems, so something that perhaps people need to get help for. And so when it's a diagnosable insomnia disorder depends on various features. So for example, we need to think about frequency. So is this just once a month? If it is, then it's unlikely to be considered insomnia. However, if it was occurring three or more times a week, then that would be one bit of information that the doctor would be interested in terms of making an insomnia diagnosis. The duration as well, I mean, I've had periods, short periods, when I've had periods of stress at work, for example, and I haven't slept

very well. But if it's going on over an extended period, so for example, over three months, then again, that would be something that a doctor would be interested in. We also think about impairment. So is this having an impairment on your daytime functioning? For example, in your work or your relationships or other areas of your life, that would be relevant to. And there are other criteria as well. So, for example, you having a reasonable opportunity to sleep. So we know, for example, with new parents, they may be woken up multiple times in the night, and this may get up for an extended period.

But it's not necessarily they have insomnia, but rather that they don't have this opportunity for just sleep in the way that other people might have. have because they're being woken because they're attempting to the needs of a newborn baby. So opportunities another thing that's considered. Yeah. And so you mentioned stress there as one possible trigger of insomnia. I was wondering what are the different reasons why people get insomnia? Is it linked to lifestyle and environment mostly?

Or is there a genetic component as well, for instance? Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think there are so many different potential triggers for insomnia. certainly stressful life events can be something that can lead to the development of insomnia. I think you asked about genetic component as well. And actually some of my work has looked at twins. I've been interested in identical and non-identical twins.

And we use this information in order to try and draw conclusions about genetic and environmental influences on sleep and relationship to other things as well. But certainly these studies seem to suggest that there is a genetic component, meaning that if you look at a group of people and we look at their individual differences in insomnia symptoms, then differences in terms of their genes may be important as well as differences in terms of their environmental experiences as well. But to go back to your question, I think this is the main causes of insomnia.

you know, there may be a genetic vulnerability in certain people. There may be life events that can lead to these sleepless nights. And then it's also quite important to then think about what happens at that point. So, you know, many people have sleepless nights and perhaps don't worry too much about them. But there can also be problems when you start sort of responding to your sleepless nights in specific ways. So, for example, the way you're thinking about this or the way that your behaviour, So that's useful to know about as well. So for example, there's no point lying in bed saying to yourself, I must sleep, I must sleep because that will that will never help you fall back asleep or

or catastrophizing about the effects of sleeplessness where you might be thinking. If you don't sleep, then this will lead to this problem and various other problems. And again, that's not helpful in terms of getting sleep. I find with me it's almost like a vicious cycle because I'll have a bad night's sleep. and then because I know how important sleep is and because I want to sleep so much, I'll try even harder the next night to sleep. And obviously, the harder you try to sleep,

the harder it is to get to sleep. So then you have another bad night's sleep. So it's almost like a kind of self-reinforcing type thing. So the way to do it, I guess, is to step back from it, is it? Almost not worry too much about it? Yeah, I mean, one of the, so when I was researching my book,

my book, one of the interesting bits of information that I was reading about was that, there have been some theories about the fact that historically we used to take two sleeps in the night. So we would go to sleep, would naturally wake up, do something else, and then go back to sleep. And one of the things that I thought about this was how positive that model could be in terms of insomnia. So instead of lying there and feeling that you're failing in terms of your sleep, potentially even think of it as sort of something that is many people experience and there are different ways of sleeping. I think as long as you give yourself sufficient opportunity, that's important, do what you can

to give yourself enough sleep. But I think, you know, things do often go wrong with sleep, but it's a good idea, if possible, not to try to overthink it. So just to kind of almost go with it and do what you can to deal with it. I mean, I can't, of course, comment on your specific case. And just to add, I'm not a medically trained. I'm not a doctor or a clinical psychologist. But certainly I would recommend people to talk to a doctor,

try and get some help. We know that for chronic insomnia at CBTI, so cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia, can be a very useful first-line approach to dealing with this. So individual people would need to speak to their doctor, about whether that would be appropriate for them, given their specific case or not. For those of us who do wake up in the middle of the night

and can't get back to sleep, what would you recommend doing? Should people get up and do something, somehow, you know, tire out their brain? Or is it just a better idea just to lie there and hope that your brain just naturally goes to sleep again? Yeah. I think it's a good idea, if possible.

I know, you know, not everyone has the luxury of multiple rooms, But if you're not in the studio, if you can perhaps leave the room, let me leave your bed, that would be a good idea. My reason for this suggestion is that there can be problems if you begin to associate your bed with sleeplessness. So if you begin to get into bed and the association that you formed with that is that of lying there awake, possibly stressed, wishing you could go back to sleep, then that's not going to be useful. So if you can get up, go and do something else, that's a very positive thing. So something we're hearing in the media quite a lot is that technology use is disrupting our sleep patterns. I was wondering if this is something you see in the data and the statistics.

Right, yeah. Well, they have now. There's a lot of interest in that particular topic, in fact. And it does seem that increased technology use is associated with, for example, delayed bedtime in adolescence and shorter. sleep, for example, so there do appear to be these links. And if you think about the possible mechanisms, this makes sense. So, for example, we know that certain types of light can disrupt our melatonin. So melatonin is the darkness hormone, which can give our body a cue that it's time to go to sleep. So if, for example, we were looking at a tablet and it was emitting a certain type of light,

that could disrupt our melatonin. So our body may not be getting a cue. that we should be going to sleep. But then there are other possibilities as well. So arousal. I know that when I look at my WhatsApp messages before bed, there's often something exciting to think about, and that's not a good idea. Or even the time that we spend on our devices

is time that we could be sleeping. But I should just caution that some researchers have pointed out that much of the data that we refer to are associations rather than showing causal links. So for example, it's being proposed that another possibility is that in some people, they may not be sleeping well, so may therefore be reaching for their technology. So it could be a kind of two-way process to some extent. Right. Okay.

And the other thing I was going to ask about is there is a lot of contradictory advice out there on how much sleep we actually need to get each night. For a long time, it seemed to be eight hours. I've heard recently, I think six hours. I know some people get by in, you know, four hours a night. Is there any scientific consensus on how many hours sleep we need, or does it just depend on the person? Yeah, yeah.

And I'm the same as you. I mean, I grew up thinking that people needed eight hours of keep a night to function well. And that was a kind of something that I think many of us just all believed. But quite recently there have been guidelines published about the amount of sleep we need each night. So the National Sleep Foundation, which is an organisation in the USA, I think designed to provide general information about sleep, proposed some guidelines. So some scientists reviewed the literature and came up with the amount of sleep that we need at different stages of the life. And like you said, you know, there are individual differences in terms of

what we need. And this was highlighted in the recommendation. So, for example, I think teenagers, it was recommended that most teenagers need between 8 and 10 hours a night. Most adults, like the older adults, need between 7 to 9 hours a night as you move into sort of 65 plus, maybe 7 to 8 hours a night. There are different amounts. But also another factor is within this paper, it also said that, and in some cases, the amount of sleep we need may be even different. even less than eight or more than 10 hours for teenagers, for example. Okay. So the slight stereotype about teenagers having long lines is kind of justified then.

Well, actually, there's another reason for that as well. There's a natural change in sleep timing that occurs during adolescence. It seems to be linked to puberty. So, yeah, if you're asking, people often say if you're asking a teenager to get up at eight, It's like asking somebody, an older person to get up at six or maybe even earlier. So there is this change. And then with the weekend lie, and this can often be to catch up with the sleep loss because obviously society doesn't allow this change in sleep timing.

And instead, teenagers have to get up to make it to school and have to or encourage to go to bed early so they can get enough sleep. So often you find that teenagers are catching up at the weekend. So for those of us who struggle to get a good night's sleep, we've talked a little bit about the kind of things that can cause that. I was wondering what your top five tips are for getting a good night's rest. Well, one thing I would say is that I don't think there's any kind of one solution. So I think lots of the tips that I have are probably ones that you've heard before. but I think probably useful bits of information are to get a consistent routine.

So to go to bed and to get up at the same time every day if you can or a similar time. And that really sort of helps your body realize when it's time to be asleep and time to be awake. So that can be useful. Does that mean no weekend lions then as well? The weekend lion is an interesting one because I think one finding is that many people are slightly sleep deprived. So it can actually be quite beneficial to catch up a little bit at the weekend. So I guess ideally we would be sleeping, getting enough sleep and sleeping at the same time in the day, in the weekdays and at the weekend. But in reality, we know that that's often impossible.

And if you're missing out on sleep during the week, then you have to sort of balance that consistency is getting enough sleep and catching up on sleep. So that was number one. What's your second one? So I think exercise can be. useful when it comes to our sleep. It can help us nod off more quickly and get a better night's sleep, so better sleep quality. And I think this is an interesting one because it was once recommended that we shouldn't exercise before bed. It makes us feel hot and alert and those things don't necessarily sit well with falling asleep. But I think more recent data don't really suggest that that's

important. So we should, you know, moderate exercise at any time appears to be a good thing when it comes to our sleep. So number three? Three, light. I think light's incredibly important when it comes to our sleep. It helps set our body clock to the world around us. So it can be good to get light during the day, helping us understand that we should be awake and also help with our levels of arousal, which are useful in the day, of course, but also equally avoiding bright light as the day progresses. So I think I mentioned before, melatonin in relation to certain types of light, for example. So it can be useful to use blackout blinds at night to stop that light disrupting our sleep. And next point, I would say, is probably try to avoid arousal before bedtime.

I mean, certainly in terms of if you're trying to resolve a problem, for example, night time might not be the best time to do that because we're often not at our best in terms of problem solving. Also, to get wound up for bed isn't going to be helpful. So nothing that kind of wakes the brain up too much. No, exactly, exactly, or work as well. I always try and avoid doing work late at night because I find that I then, if I do that, I then lie in bed and think about the various bits of work. that I've been doing, yeah.

So have you got one more tip? I would say, think about what you eat and drink. I mean, there's lots of information out there about things like, I don't know, drinking milk before bed or eating a kiwi before bed or eating certain types of cherries. And my reading of the literature is that there's not a great deal of evidence, or not very robust evidence. to say that they're definitely going to be helpful for your sleep. But what is much clearer is that certain things that we consume can cause problems for our

sleep. So the most obvious ones being caffeine and alcohol, what's amazing about caffeine is how long the effects can last in your body. So even consuming coffee quite early can or other types of caffeine as well. Of course, caffeine's not just in coffee. But can affect our sleep. at night, including our sleep architecture, so the structure of our sleep. So I would recommend, I mean, ideally avoiding caffeine altogether, but possibly, certainly avoiding it as the day progresses.

And with alcohol, people often think, you know, a nightcap will help with your sleep. But it seems to, you know, many people report nodding off straight away after drinking alcohol. But then the issue can be that you wake up during the second part of the night and you have much more fragmented sleep. Right. So the sleep quality is reduced then. Yes, yes, exactly, especially during that second part of the night. Okay, well, the last question I've got for you, Alice, is I was wondering, as a sleep researcher, do you practice what you preach? Have you become an expert at sleeping? Actually, my sleep's not too bad. There are lots of things that I definitely do right.

So I prioritize my sleep. If the dishes are in the sink, I've been known more than once to say to my husband, I can't possibly do them now because I'm, you know, I need to get my full eight-hour sleep. So, yeah, I use it as an excuse for sure. Also, consistency is something I do pretty well, actually. I get exhausted.

So by 10 o'clock, I use. you almost always get into bed. I mean, of course, I've got a bit of a social life. So occasionally, I have a late night and that's great. But on the whole, I tend to have a pretty consistent routine. And my kids also are very good acting like an alarm clock and getting me up at the same time every day. So that's what I do. Well, I also don't work at night. I almost never work at night, actually, because I do find that that can disrupt my sleep. But I am terrible when it comes to caffeine and I have a coffee day right now, actually.

And I'm also not brilliant at turning down a glass of wine in the evening just because it will affect my sleep. So I could do better. That was Alice Gregory talking about the science of a good night's sleep. Her book, Notting Off, is out now. Thanks for listening to the Science Focus podcast. The November issue of BBC Focus magazine is on sale now and in it we find out how spider bots could help reveal more about Neanderthal brains.

We also reveal how wolves communicate using facial expressions, explore the intriguing world of microbes in the British gut, discover how lava lamps are linked to election hacking, and find out more about the British spaceport. Thank you for listening to the Science Focus podcast from the BBC Focus magazine team. We're the UK's best-selling science and technology monthly, available in print and in several digital formats throughout the world. Find out more at ScienceFocus.com will look out for us in your app store. This podcast is sponsored by Name, Audio and Focal.

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