Sleep 101

Can sleep build strong bones? Experts say yes. Find out the benefits of healthy sleep on every part of your body.

Being asleep may seem like the ultimate form of inactivity, but those unconscious hours are actually a time of hard work for your body. Sleeping is one way that your body recovers from damage and protects itself against illness, says Michael Twery, PhD, director of the National Center on Sleep Disorders Research for the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute. ...

Daylight-saving time doesn’t have to disrupt your sleep schedule. A few simple tips help ensure sound sleep during daylight-saving time and beyond.

For most of us, the springtime switch from standard to daylight-saving time is merely an inconvenience. It might be the cause of skipped appointments if we manage to miss all those reminders telling us to move our clocks forward one hour on the second Sunday in March.

But for others, the first few days of daylight saving time can mean ...

Daydreamers may have trouble turning off the part of their brain linked to a wandering mind, which could put them at risk for insomnia, according to a new study.

Daydreaming may keep you up at night, according to a new study published in the journal Sleep. Researchers from the University of California, San Diego found that people who daydream may be unable to stop thoughts from appearing in their head, which can keep them up at night and cause trouble concentrating ...

Study finds it’s a time when people get less shut-eye, have shorter periods of deep sleep.

Many myths have told of the powers of a full moon, from werewolves to sudden madness to unexplained seizures, but new research suggests an impact close to home: Sound sleep may be harder to come by when the moon is in its full glory.

The study suggests that the human body is cued not only to the daily rising and setting of the sun, which regulates ...

Depression and menopause are just two medical conditions that can rob you of sleep. Discover other culprits that can cause insomnia.

Having problems going to sleep or staying asleep? A health condition could be to blame. Research suggests that sleep disturbances such as insomnia are rooted in certain medical conditions.

“We’re finding that both the quantity and quality of sleep a person gets can be linked to a number of health issues and diseases,” says James Wellman, MD, medical director of the ...

Sleeping alone strategies do not alter likelihood of sleeping disorders later in life.

Behavioral techniques for getting babies to sleep by themselves, such as camping out in the child’s room initially, can be effective without any long-term downside for parents or children, clinical trial follow-up showed.

Sleep problems at age 6 weren’t significantly more common among kids trained to go to bed with such methods as infants, reported Anna M.H. Price, PhD, of the Royal Children’s Hospital in Parkville, Australia, and colleagues.

The ...

Participants reacted to information given as they slept, after waking.

People may be able to learn while they sleep, according to a new study.

Israeli researchers played tones followed by certain odors to people who were sleeping. The participants started sniffing when they heard the tones alone — even when there was no odor present — both during sleep and when they were awake.

The results show that people can learn new information while they sleep, and this can unconsciously affect their behavior ...

External stimulation during sleep can reinforce what you have already learned, study shows.

External stimulation during sleep can help strengthen memory, which, in turn, can help you learn, a new study reports.

Researchers from Northwestern University noted that such stimulation could reinforce what people have already learned, but doesn’t help them gain new skills.

“The critical difference is that our research shows that memory is strengthened for something you’ve already learned,” the study’s co-author, Paul Reber, associate professor of psychology at Northwestern, ...

It’s not your imagination — it really is harder to focus today. Here, why you can’t stop checking Twitter or looking for adorable photos of puppies. (Hint: It has to do with daylight saving time!)

Feel like you’re more distracted than usual by Facebook? Have a sudden need to know everything about Jessica Biel’s engagement ring? Lost in a haze of cute puppy pictures and funny cat videos? It’s not just you — and it’s not your fault, according to research.

A ...

Some lucky people can get by on only four to six hours of shut-eye a night. We hate to break it to you, but you’re probably not one of them. Here, the truth about how much sleep you really need — and what can happen if you don’t get it.

Thomas Edison thought it was waste of time. Bill Clinton used to brag that he could get by on only five hours of it a night. And Margaret Thatcher once famously ...