Johns Hopkins Health Alert
Sleep, Memory, and the Brain
http://www.johnshopkinshealthalerts.com/alerts/memory/JohnsHopkinsMemoryHealthAlert_2849-1.html?ET=johnshopkins_blog:e13516:302269a:&st=email&st=email&s=EMH_090112_013
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When you're sleep deprived, cognition is one of the first functions to decline. Shortchange yourself on sleep by staying up late, continue this night after night, and you ultimately shortchange your memory. And if the problem is not resolved, your memory -- and your brain -- will not be functioning in the best way possible.
In this excerpt from our Johns Hopkins Memory Bulletin, neurologists Marilyn Albert, Ph.D. and Guy McKann, M.D. answer questions about sleep and how it affects the brain and memory.
Q. How much sleep does an adult need each night?
A. As people get older, a decrease begins in both the total time sleeping and the amount of time spent in the stage of sleep associated with dreaming. A newborn sleeps 16 hours per day. In contrast, the baby's 30-year-old mother sleeps six hours per day (if she's lucky), and only one quarter of this time, or two hours, is occupied by the deepest stage of sleep.
Starting in middle age (between 45 and 60), not only does the amount of sleep per night start to decrease, but also the character of sleep changes. People at these ages spend less time in the stage of sleep associated with dreaming and more time in the lighter stages.
As people get older, they are more likely to shift the time when they sleep, some going to bed and to sleep earlier and waking up earlier. Others are the opposite, staying up late into the night and sleeping much of the day. When people are in their 80s, these changes are even more pronounced. Their total time asleep per day may be only six or seven hours, including time spent in daytime naps. Even though a person may take several naps a day, the total time sleeping in naps is rarely over an hour. The idea that older individuals should sleep soundly for eight to 10 hours is clearly wrong.
As a rule of thumb, one hour of sleep is required for two hours of being awake. As we get older, that ratio becomes closer to 45 minutes of sleep to each two hours awake. In other words, throughout the day you gradually accumulate a "sleep debt." By the end of a 16-hour day, a younger person owes the "sleep bank" eight hours. In contrast, an older person has a sleep debt of only about six hours. By the end of a week, you may have accumulated a sleep debt of eight to 10 hours.
Q. What are the effects of sleep deprivation?
A. If you don't allot enough time for sleep, you become sleep deprived. Besides being sleepy during the daytime, sleep-deprived people often have problems with their thinking. They are slower to learn new things, they may have problems with memory, and their ability to make judgments may be faulty, enough so that they may think they are really starting to "lose it" when the problem is really not enough sleep.
Elderly people do not recover from sleep deprivation as quickly as younger people. In experimental situations where people are kept awake for 24 hours, those in their 70s take at least a day longer to recover from their subsequent daytime sleepiness than younger people. Gender may also make a difference in the time it takes to recover from sleep deprivation; women seem to be able to recover faster than men.
Posted in Memory on January 12, 2009
Monday, January 12, 2009
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Laughter Makes Everything Better
I found a great site that will really get you laughing: http://humour.200ok.com.au
The site has humor on a lot of different topics, so you are sure to find something that puts a smile on your face. Chances are you'll even laugh out loud. Read on for a sampling of what you will find:
It loses something in the translation
1. The Dairy Association's huge success with the campaign "Got Milk?" prompted them to expand advertising to Mexico. It was soon brought to their attention the Spanish translation read "Are you lactating?"
2. Coors put its slogan, "Turn It Loose," into Spanish, where it was read as "Suffer From Diarrhea."
3. Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an American campaign: "Nothing sucks like an Electrolux."
4. Clairol introduced the "Mist Stick," a curling iron, into Germany only to find out that "mist" is slang for manure. Not too many people had use for the "Manure Stick."
5. When Gerber started selling baby food in Africa, they used the same packaging as in the US, with the smiling baby on the label. Later they learned that in Africa, companies routinely put pictures on the labels of what's inside, since many people can't read.
6. Colgate introduced a toothpaste in France called Cue, the name of a notorious porno magazine.
7. An American T-shirt maker in Miami printed shirts for the Spanish market which promoted the Pope's visit. Instead of "I saw the Pope" (el Papa), the shirts read "I Saw the Potato" (la papa).
8. Pepsi's "Come Alive With the Pepsi Generation" translated into "Pepsi Brings Your Ancestors Back From the Grave" in Chinese.
9. The Coca-Cola name in China was first read as "Kekoukela", meaning "Bite the wax tadpole" or "female horse stuffed with wax", depending on the dialect. Coke then researched 40,000 characters to find a phonetic equivalent "kokou kole", translating into "happiness in the mouth."
10. When Parker Pen marketed a ball-point pen in Mexico, its ads were supposed to have read, "It won't leak in your pocket and embarrass you." The company thought that the word "embarazar" (to impregnate) meant to embarrass, so the ad read: "It won't leak in your pocket and make you pregnant!"
11. When American Airlines wanted to advertise its new leather first class seats in the Mexican market, it translated its "Fly In Leather" campaign literally, which meant "Fly Naked" (vuela en cuero) in Spanish!
The way engineers think
A priest, a doctor, and an engineer were waiting one morning for a particularly slow group of golfers.
Engineer: What's with these guys? We must have been waiting for 15 minutes!
Doctor: I don't know but I've never seen such ineptitude!
Priest: Hey, here comes the greenskeeper. Let's have a word with him.
Priest: Hi George. Say George, what's with that group ahead of us? They're rather slow aren't they?
George: Oh yes. That's a group of blind fire fighters. They lost their sight while saving our club house last year. So we let them play here anytime free of charge!
(silence)
Priest: That's so sad. I think I will say a special prayer for them tonight.
Doctor: Good idea. And I'm going to contact my ophthalmologist buddy and see if there's anything he can do for them.
Engineer: Why can't these guys play at night?
There are plenty more on the site. So have fun.
The site has humor on a lot of different topics, so you are sure to find something that puts a smile on your face. Chances are you'll even laugh out loud. Read on for a sampling of what you will find:
It loses something in the translation
1. The Dairy Association's huge success with the campaign "Got Milk?" prompted them to expand advertising to Mexico. It was soon brought to their attention the Spanish translation read "Are you lactating?"
2. Coors put its slogan, "Turn It Loose," into Spanish, where it was read as "Suffer From Diarrhea."
3. Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an American campaign: "Nothing sucks like an Electrolux."
4. Clairol introduced the "Mist Stick," a curling iron, into Germany only to find out that "mist" is slang for manure. Not too many people had use for the "Manure Stick."
5. When Gerber started selling baby food in Africa, they used the same packaging as in the US, with the smiling baby on the label. Later they learned that in Africa, companies routinely put pictures on the labels of what's inside, since many people can't read.
6. Colgate introduced a toothpaste in France called Cue, the name of a notorious porno magazine.
7. An American T-shirt maker in Miami printed shirts for the Spanish market which promoted the Pope's visit. Instead of "I saw the Pope" (el Papa), the shirts read "I Saw the Potato" (la papa).
8. Pepsi's "Come Alive With the Pepsi Generation" translated into "Pepsi Brings Your Ancestors Back From the Grave" in Chinese.
9. The Coca-Cola name in China was first read as "Kekoukela", meaning "Bite the wax tadpole" or "female horse stuffed with wax", depending on the dialect. Coke then researched 40,000 characters to find a phonetic equivalent "kokou kole", translating into "happiness in the mouth."
10. When Parker Pen marketed a ball-point pen in Mexico, its ads were supposed to have read, "It won't leak in your pocket and embarrass you." The company thought that the word "embarazar" (to impregnate) meant to embarrass, so the ad read: "It won't leak in your pocket and make you pregnant!"
11. When American Airlines wanted to advertise its new leather first class seats in the Mexican market, it translated its "Fly In Leather" campaign literally, which meant "Fly Naked" (vuela en cuero) in Spanish!
The way engineers think
A priest, a doctor, and an engineer were waiting one morning for a particularly slow group of golfers.
Engineer: What's with these guys? We must have been waiting for 15 minutes!
Doctor: I don't know but I've never seen such ineptitude!
Priest: Hey, here comes the greenskeeper. Let's have a word with him.
Priest: Hi George. Say George, what's with that group ahead of us? They're rather slow aren't they?
George: Oh yes. That's a group of blind fire fighters. They lost their sight while saving our club house last year. So we let them play here anytime free of charge!
(silence)
Priest: That's so sad. I think I will say a special prayer for them tonight.
Doctor: Good idea. And I'm going to contact my ophthalmologist buddy and see if there's anything he can do for them.
Engineer: Why can't these guys play at night?
There are plenty more on the site. So have fun.
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Sustainable Living Creates a Quality Lifestyle
If you are interested in learning more about living a healthy, quality lifestyle in SWFL, check out some ebooks that you can consume and distribute as you please.
Just fill out the form below and indicate what particular lifestyle interest you may have. You will be directed to the ebook download page.
Just fill out the form below and indicate what particular lifestyle interest you may have. You will be directed to the ebook download page.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Work at Home is a Good Fit for People with Fibro and Other Physical Challenges
Times are indeed tough. There is a lot of competition out there for jobs. Stress levels are at an all time high. A lot of the stress comes from having lost a sense of control in one's life. People need to find small ways to get that control back. This will help one focus on "can do" things instead of being overwhelmed by negatives; no matter what causes them.
If you are unemployed and/or have special reasons for not working outside of your home you should consider starting an online business. You don't have to be an internet guru and buy all the internet marketing products in order to succeed. Simply hire someone who has taken the route to becoming knowledgeable about online marketing. Put your focus on your business and your interests and outsource whatever is necessary but exists outside of your expertise.
During my hiatus from this blog (which is fun for me) I developed a marketing team to do just that for small businesses and solopreneurs (well that was fun too;). I going to put some clips in from a post I made on another blog I have http://no-drugs-fibro-treament.com so you can see the offer I made there for Update Small Business.
If you are unemployed and/or have special reasons for not working outside of your home you should consider starting an online business. You don't have to be an internet guru and buy all the internet marketing products in order to succeed. Simply hire someone who has taken the route to becoming knowledgeable about online marketing. Put your focus on your business and your interests and outsource whatever is necessary but exists outside of your expertise.
During my hiatus from this blog (which is fun for me) I developed a marketing team to do just that for small businesses and solopreneurs (well that was fun too;). I going to put some clips in from a post I made on another blog I have http://no-drugs-fibro-treament.com so you can see the offer I made there for Update Small Business.
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