Nguyen

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Jenny Nguyen
Malcolm Campbell
URWT 1103
29 March 2015
Sleep Deprivation and the Deadly Consequences
Here is a short story about the Joubert family tragedy. In June 2002, a family of eight
driving on the interstate slammed their Chevy Suburban right into an 18-wheel trailer parked on
the side of the road. Six died, including the mother and five of six children. The father, Israel
Lane Joubert, was the one driving the car and survived the car accident along with his sixth
child. They were both critically injured, with their son losing 90% of his liver (Los Angeles
Times). All the children were 14 and under. According to Brown Fryer, in his Harvard Business
Review issue, Sleep Deficit: The Performance Killer, the family was driving through the night
coming back from a family union, hoping to return to work by 8 a.m., when the accident
occurred. Israel had fallen asleep for possibly one exact reason: sleep deprivation. Sleep
deprivation can bring about numerous consequences that can affect drivers, workers and the
general public. Why can it be so deadly? The answers lie within our brain and body functions
while sleep deprived. Lack of sleep can have detrimental affects on our cognitive performance,
which accounts for our actions, thoughts, mood, and pretty much anything involving what makes
us who we are. Our body can suffer as a result of reduced metabolism, which can strain our
cardiovascular system altogether, resulting in many serious health issues.
Why do we need sleep? What is the real reason behind sleep, other than for survival?
According to Seth Maxons How Sleep Deprivation Decays the Mind and Body, no one
understands the real biological reason behind sleep. There are many theories surrounding this

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mystery, but it has never been proclaimed. It could be that our brain shuts down to store the
days memories, or it could be a way to regulate our bodys hormones. But for what it is known,
all humans need an average of seven to eight hours of sleep (Maxon). If fact, the numbers have
gone down since the 1960s. In Matt T. Bianchis Sleep Deprivation and Disease: Effects on the
body, brain and Behavior, in the 1960s, Americans slept an average of eight to nine hours. By
the 1990s, numbers declined to an average of seven hours. It can be assumed, that because of our
working society with more stress and longer work hours, the number of sleep-deprived workers
have increased. A resource from the Division of Sleep Medicine at Harvard Medical School
suggests that sleep is important because memory consolidation takes place during this time,
which means your brain stores and process memories and neuron pathways become stronger.
This process is made possible to learn and recall new information. The REM stage of sleep, or
rapid-eye movement sleep is essential in acquiring new information, which is also the phase
where dreams are more prevalent. Sleep deprivation interferes with this ability, resulting in
extreme exhaustion, which plays a role with slow performance, lack of focus, and attention
(Harvard). So what can happen when we go without sleep for a long period of time?
According to Maxon, going without sleep can cause hallucinations, psychosis, and longterm memory impairment. Studies from the University of Pennsylvania found that going 88
hours without sleep can cause cognitive impairment is otherwise healthy adults. In 1989, at the
University of Chicago, a study on sleep deprivation performed on rats showed that after several
weeks of no sleep, all the rats died. Although there have been debates whether sleep deprivation
can kill you, there are studies that have shown suppression in the immune system from lack of
sleep, which can ultimately attract other forms of illness, resulting in death. Sleep deprivation
also has profound affects our mood and behavior. In his article, Maxon narrates his own

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experience with sleep deprivationan experiment he had undergone himselfwhich landed him
in the hospital days later with no recollection. He was eighteen at that timea relatively healthy
young adultwho was on a trip to Italy with his school, when he stayed up for four days
consecutively. He recounts his experiences with hallucinations, rambling, losing focus, and even
sudden shifts of mood and behavior. His teacher even asked if he was on LSD because he was
doing things he would have never done, such as stealing things from a gift shop. Our brain
regulates the flow of epinephrine, dopamine, and serotonin; chemicals in our brain that are also
responsible for mood and behavior. This could be why lack of sleep is linked to manic feelings,
depression and bipolar disorders (Maxon). Our general feelings of moodiness we get from
staying up into the night can be explained from this reason.
Interestingly, sleep deprivation has been used as a torture tactic because of the mental
manipulation capabilities captors can do on their prisoners. According to Maxon, sleepiness
befogs the reason, undermines the will, and the human being ceases to be himself, to be his own
I. Sleep deprivation is used as a torture tactic because it left no mark, and can easily break
a prisoners will. Prisoners are held captive and kept awake for days, which makes them more
susceptible to interrogation and decreases pain tolerance (Maxon).
Fryer explores in his Harvard Business Review issue four major impacts sleep
deprivation has on our cognitive performance. Throughout the day, everyone has a built up of
homeostatic pressure for sleep. This need becomes stronger depending on how much sleep a
person had the night before. Our sleep and wake up cycles are completely involuntary. We
cannot control when we sleep or when we wake up, even though most people think they do. This
is especially true when we become extremely drowsy. As discovered by Dr. Clif Saper at
Harvard Medical School, when we become drowsy, it can be a sign that our brain is telling us we

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need to sleep soon, or it will seize control. When our homeostatic pressure becomes too great,
thousand of neurons in our brain responsible for sleep ignite, which then causes sleep to seize the
brain anywhere at anytime (Fryer). This is especially true with drivers who become drowsy and
falls asleep at the wheel without remembering they did. Specialists also call this micro sleeps,
when the brain forces the body to sleep on its own (Maxon).
The second major impact on our cognitive perform according to Fryer is determined from
the amount of hours you sleep over several days. With eight complete hours of sleep everyday,
we are expected to be stable. With less sleep, we build up sleep deficit, which results in cognitive
impairment. Being awake for over twenty-four hours is equivalent to legal drunkenness, which
can also result in: slurred speech, longer reaction time, short and long term memory problems,
affects decision making capacity, math processing, cognitive speed, impedes judgment, and
spatial orientation. This is also true when someone cuts back hours of sleep over a period of
days. When a person sleeps an average of five to six hours a night for several days in a row,
these effects magnifies (Fryer). Serious lack of sleep can also increases temporary lapses in
attention, which is when a person experience periods of non-responsiveness lasting a second
(Bianchi). According to Maxons own experience, there were days where he completely
renounced speech altogether and days where he only spoke rhyme.
The third impact on our cognitive performance according to Fryer involves our circadian
rhythm. This refers to our internal body clock or neurological timing device. This tells our
body when its dawn or midnight. It sends out the strongest sleep drive just before we wake
up and the strongest wake drive when we are about to go to sleep. Our homeostatic pressure
works together with the circadian rhythm, though they work in opposition to one another. Most
scientists dont have clear explanations for this phenomenon, but because we dont take frequent

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naps like most animals, it helps us stay awake and sleep in one long interval. As midafternoon
arrives, we usually have the need to sleep or take a nap, which is why many people turn to
caffeine to help them stay awake. Caffeine temporarily blocks receptors in our brain that
regulates sleep. At this time, our homeostatic pressure for sleep builds up, but our circadian
rhythm hasnt settled in to keep us awake. As it eventually does, we are able to stay awake
through the day. As night falls, melatonin, a hormone that regulates sleep and wake cycles,
increases, which then quiets the circadian signal to stay awake, allowing us to fall asleep. As our
homeostatic pressure goes away, the circadian sends out sleep signals through the night and
increases until morning. As we wake up, melatonin declines (Fryer).
The final impact on cognitive performance from sleep deprivation involves sleep
inertia, which is the grogginess many people experience when first waking up. During this
period, our brain needs to wake up, which also means our memory and decision-making isnt at
its peak during this time. It doesnt actually reach its peak until a couple hours later. Sleep inertia
is especially dangerous for drivers and workers. Drowsy drivers accounts for a fifth of car
accidents in the United States annually. This is equivalent to 8,000 deaths per year. An estimated
80,000 drivers fall asleep while driving everything, with 10% swerving off the road and every
two minutes, one crashes. Workers are also at risk from sleep deprivation. Interestingly, many
work accidents mentioned on media are a result of tired, sleep-deprived workers. The oil spill of
Exxon Valdez and an incident involving a metro train in New York that derailed were caused by
sleep deprived workers (Maxon). These workers put themselves, companies and the general
public in dangerous situations because most companies dont enforce policies on how much
sleep a worker needs, but enforces policies on drinking, smoking, etc. (Fryer). Sleepiness and
alcohol intoxication parallels each other more closely than most realize (Bianchi).

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Sleep deprivation have been shown to increase weight gain, heart disease, type II diabetes
and high blood pressure. These health problems can cause serious cardiovascular diseases in the
future, which is why sleep deprivation can cause long-term effects (Bianchi). While we sleep,
our body undergoes multiple repairs. According to Maxon, our cells provide oxygen and glucose
as by-products as they undergo cycles of repair when we sleep. So what happens when we stay
up all night? Our brain denies these products, which then hampers our organs disrupting our
body systems. While we are awake throughout the day, our cells burn off energy, releasing what
scientist call substance S. Substance S is believed to be adenosine, which is release as a byproduct of these cells into the blood stream. When we sleep, our body clears our blood stream of
this substance, but if we dont this substance can pile up, clogging our system (Maxon). As
mentioned earlier, we have our own circadian body clock. Carolyn Kylstra, from BuzzFeed
Staff wrote in her article, 10 Horrible Things Pulling An All-Nighter Does to Your Brain, our
hypothalamus in the brain is in charge of the circadian clock that every cell in the body has. It
makes sure everything functions normally. Throughout the day, we send different signals to our
hypothalamus to activate different hormones to trigger hunger, sleepiness, etc. Being sleep
deprived, these signals mess up, which causes you to feel hungry late at night, leading to
unhealthy snacking (Kylstra). Denise Manns Sleep and Weight Gain on WebMD, reviewed by
Hansa D. Bhargava, MD, she states that while sleep deprived and tired, we are running low on
energy, causing us to turn to unhealthy snacks to wake us up. Without good sleep quality, our
metabolism doesnt function properly, causing unwanted weight gain and could ultimately lead
to obesity (Mann).
Its pretty clear; sleep deprivation has numerous effects on every part of the human body.
Sleep is a natural part of our routine that every animals needs to survive. Our cells and our

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organs malfunction if we dont nourish our body with quality sleep. Brain performance goes out
of sync and our body suffers, resulting in cardiovascular and metabolic illnesses. Drowsy drivers
and tired workers put themselves and others at risk because of lack of sleep. Even the
government adopted sleep deprivation as a torture tactic because of how much it impairs the
brain. All of these show how sleep deprivation can be so deadly for us. It explains the reason
why many doctors emphasize getting eight hours of sleep is essential to maintain good health. A
majority of the population has experience twenty-four hours or more of no sleep at one point in
their lives. The exhaustion can be very overwhelming.

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Works Cited
Bianchi, Matt T. Sleep Deprivation and Disease: Effects on the Body, Brain and Behavior. 2014.
Web. 2 Apr. 2015
Fryer, Bronwyn. "Sleep Deficit: the Performance Killer." Harvard Business Review. Harvard
Business School Publishing, Oct. 2006. Web. 2 Apr. 2015
Kylstra, Carolyn. "10 Horrible Things Pulling an All-Nighter Does to Your Brain." BuzzFeed.
BuzzFeed Staff, June . Web. 2 Apr. 2015.
Mann, Denise. "Sleep and Weight Gain." Coping With Excessive Sleepiness. WebMD, Web. 2
Apr. 2015.
Maxon, Seth. "How Sleep Deprivation Decays the Mind and Body." The Atlantic. The Atlantic,
30 Dec. 2013. Web. 2 Apr. 2015.
Press, Associated, ed. "6 Killed as SUV Hits Big Rig." Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times,
11 June 2002. Web. 2 Apr. 2015.