Ka Leo O Hawaii

Issue date: 1/16/08 Section: Commentary

Media Credit: Meghan Lopez Sleep deprivation impairs information retention and affects academic performance.

Little sleep and a lot of cramming. Sound familiar? Many college students have serious issues when it comes to getting the recommended sleep dosage. The importance of sleep has been repeated to us for years, but the consequences of sleep deprivation are soon forgotten once classes begin and term papers are assigned.

"It has been proven that a sleepy driver is just as dangerous as a drunk driver," said Tracy Kuo, a clinical psychologist and behavioral sleep medicine technician at the Stanford Sleep Disorders Clinic.

One of the benefits of college is that a new semester resets your schedule, giving you a chance to start over. Nonetheless, a fresh start can, and often does, lead to just another semester of falling behind in school with the numerous homework assignments given.

This is exactly why good study habits could result in more sleep throughout the semester. Taking the time to study in advance will better prepare you for exams, leading to less cramming and greater long-term retention.

But it's not how you store information that's important; it's the retrieval process that matters. What information is remembered depends on the emotional significance of the information needed (a strong memory associated with a particular emotion) and how often that information has been called upon before.

Thus, consistent study habits lead to better test results than last-minute cramming. In fact, it is believed that if you were to get a full night's sleep before a test, you would receive a better grade because your brain would recall the information with greater speed and accuracy.

Sleep deprivation isn't just about the amount of sleep you try to achieve each night, it's about the quality of the sleep you accomplish. It is better for you to get only four hours of uninterrupted, deep sleep each night than eight or nine hours of light sleep with constant interruption.

Many college students' habits during the day cause them to sleep less during the night. For example, caffeine can affect sleep immensely, along with alcohol and nicotine, which impair your digestive capacity. Regular exercise and eating early meals also subtract the number of sheep you are counting before you nod off, since both of these activities send hormones racing through your body.

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