You Snooze, You Lose? Not True
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Think about it. What would you really prefer – being well-rested, or being a caffeine zombie?
Tired after lunch or by mid-afternoon? You might think that you should go buy yourself some coffee. But according to UCSD researcher Sara Mednick, you’re better off taking a nap.
Mednick, a faculty member in the department of psychiatry at the School of Medicine, has been researching napping since graduate school and recently published a book, titled “Take a Nap! Change Your Life.”
I like it. This is really "news you can use."
Some of her most striking research looks at napping compared to drinking caffeine. In one study, Mednick had one group of subjects nap for 90 minutes, while another drank 200 mg of caffeine. She also set up a control group, who took a placebo. Then she tested her subjects on several tasks, including typing and spatial skills, such as remembering the layout of a room or a map. On both tasks, coffee drinkers performed much worse than the placebo group, Mednick said. “Of course, this is a bummer for Starbucks,” she added.
Think about it. What would you really prefer – being well-rested, or being a caffeine zombie?