[HN Gopher] Left brain hemisphere more awake the first night sle...
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Left brain hemisphere more awake the first night sleeping in a new
place (2016)
Author : giuliomagnifico
Score : 99 points
Date : 2021-02-14 08:11 UTC (14 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.npr.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.npr.org)
| Pyramus wrote:
| I've worked with sleep labs on a project regarding actigraphy
| data and another interesting tidbit is the fact that we wake up
| 20-30 times per night but have no recollection of it.
|
| We don't know why this is the case, but one theory is related to
| the story of the ducks in the article. In our past we used to
| sleep in groups and so at every point in time, at least one group
| member was alert to watch out for predators.
| belltaco wrote:
| >In our past we used to sleep in groups and so at every point
| in time, at least one group member was alert to watch out for
| predators
|
| This is also the reason behind evolutionary pressure to have a
| certain percentage of night owls among the tribe who naturally
| sleep late and act as eyes and ears against predators.
| smogcutter wrote:
| That's interesting, who says that?
| mobilemidget wrote:
| Makes me wonder if people going for some 24 hour observation
| research (epilepsy patients, etc) shouldn't at least go for 2
| nights, 48 hours monitoring.
| smlckz wrote:
| > Sasaki says that brain response is involuntary and there's
| nothing people can do to prevent it, even if they've just flown
| in for a big presentation the next morning. So lots of coffee the
| next morning.
|
| Hah.
| lapcatsoftware wrote:
| This submission should be labeled (2016).
|
| My whole brain is awake the first night in a new place. I just
| can't sleep.
| nickjj wrote:
| > My whole brain is awake the first night in a new place. I
| just can't sleep.
|
| Me too, it usually takes me 3 nights to really feel like I'm
| able to sleep.
|
| The first 2 nights I'm pretty much consciously awake the whole
| time. By the 3rd night I usually have spurts of dreams I can
| remember and generally feel more rested the day after.
|
| I don't have any issues sleeping at home tho. I tend to goto
| bed when I feel tired, fall asleep easily and haven't woken up
| to an alarm clock in 15 years other than a few times where I
| set it because I had to be up much earlier than usual for very
| important things.
| apohn wrote:
| IME 2-3 nights to get used to it is about right.
| bonoboTP wrote:
| > The first 2 nights I'm pretty much consciously awake the
| whole time.
|
| I believe that this is your experience, but I wonder it's
| actually true or there are short sleeping periods
| (microsleeps or perhaps longer) that you don't notice or
| remember. I've heard from some people for example that they
| literally didn't sleep for a week at some point, but this is
| very dubious regarding health effects.
|
| For me, if I actually skip 2 nights sleep (e.g. travelling)
| I'm barely able to speak in coherent sentences or make
| decisions, my vision blurs, I feel derealization etc.
| nickjj wrote:
| I think there's a really big difference between legit
| staying up, as in not even laying down to rest for 48 hours
| and laying in bed with your eyes mostly closed for 6-8
| hours at night while consciously knowing you're not
| sleeping.
|
| Human bodies react very differently too.
|
| I remember doing a tech related trip once where it was
| crazy schedules (up at ~6-7am and back in the hotel room at
| 9:30pm-10pm) for 3 nights and then waking up at 4:45am on
| the last day to catch a 6+ hour flight home (10 hours with
| lay overs) and arriving at home. That was with very limited
| travel experience and having to be video recorded / mic'd
| up for 6-8 hours a day to interact with multiple tech
| presentations. Basically very stressful for someone who
| never did any of that before and is generally not that
| outgoing.
|
| I never really felt too tired in the moment and I know for
| sure I didn't sleep the first 2 nights and did get a few
| solid hours of real sleep on the 3rd night. Honestly I was
| pretty surprised at how well things turned out. I used to
| pull a lot of all nighters as a teenager playing video
| games. Usually by ~36 hours I felt some side effects like
| brain fog and being ridiculously tired but by the end of
| that stretch it was a way different (and worse) experience
| than that travel experience, or laying in bed for ~6-8
| hours with my eyes closed at night but not sleeping for a
| few nights.
| lapcatsoftware wrote:
| > For me, if I actually skip 2 nights sleep (e.g.
| travelling) I'm barely able to speak in coherent sentences
| or make decisions, my vision blurs, I feel derealization
| etc.
|
| Then do an all-day on-site technical job interview.
| coldtea wrote:
| Well, lots of people (me included) sleep like logs after a long
| flight and a few hours in the new place...
| dazc wrote:
| I have found that having a nap as soon as I arrive in a new
| hotel room actually helps a lot. Even if doesn't work for you
| at least you'll have had the benefit of the nap.
| amelius wrote:
| What if you sleep with VR goggles, showing images of home?
|
| Or (more practical) what if you sleep in a hotel room for a week,
| then move to a hotel room in a different country which looks
| exactly like the old hotel room?
| cjfont wrote:
| Or what about sleeping in an RV, parked at different locations
| each night.
| notahacker wrote:
| I don't know about you, but I shut my eyes when I try to sleep!
| Sensory stuff is likely to be more subtle, mostly subconscious
| things like differences in the mattress, ambient temperature,
| smell etc and your brain probably stores the fact you navigated
| to a different place somewhere.
| dazc wrote:
| In the UK at least, the rooms in all major budget hotel chains
| are almost identical reagrdless of location. I have stayed in
| many and, as reguler travellers may agree, it's normal to wake
| up and not be entirely sure which location you're currently at.
|
| I can confirm, from personal experience at least, that it makes
| little difference - the first night is always difficult in
| terms of getting a good night's sleep.
| jniedrauer wrote:
| You really feel this effect when sleeping alone in the
| wilderness. You can hear every mouse or rabbit for hundreds of
| feet in any direction, even while asleep. If you know there are
| other apex predators in the area, you'll feel some primal
| instincts come back to life. It's worth experiencing at least a
| few times in your life.
| cozos wrote:
| > Rattenborg found that ducks with a bird on either side of them
| put their entire brain to sleep and kept both eyes closed.
|
| Does this work for us too? I'm gonna try to sleep on the right
| side of my SO when traveling.
| [deleted]
| anu7df wrote:
| For a second there I thought you were going to propose an
| experiment that would put you on the not right side of your SO
| for a long long time.. :)
|
| Seriously though, the point would be to have people on either
| side, not the side of the brain you want to put to sleep..
| cozos wrote:
| i thought about that too, but as you said it would be
| impractical :)
|
| waifu pillows on both sides perhaps?
| helsinkiandrew wrote:
| When sleeping in a new place, new home, hotel, or vacation I
| often have this fairly stressful reoccurring dream of living in a
| slightly dilapidated house (different every time). I often wake
| in the night feeling very confused where I am or if the dream is
| real (if that's where I actually live) it takes a few minutes for
| me to figure out what's what.
|
| I've often thought that this was probably something left from
| when we were living in caves or hiding from predators were you
| need to be sure that a new sleeping place is safe.
| mupuff1234 wrote:
| I usually have the opposite phenomenon. I go traveling for a
| few weeks sleeping in different places with no issues
| whatsoever. But then when I'm back home I find myself waking up
| in the middle of the night not grasping where I am for a few
| minutes.
| sandworm101 wrote:
| >> in caves or hiding from predators
|
| More likely the worry is other humans. We are territorial.
| Sleeping indicates a confidence in one's safety in a location.
| It can be a sign of dominance. Watch any cat sleeping in a
| dog's bed just to show who is in charge. I suggest that when in
| a new place we worried more about the locals not wanting us in
| their territory than the lions wanting to eat us.
| kortex wrote:
| I've actually experienced both sides of this in a way.
| Usually when I go camping, I have the mentioned brain-half-
| tuned-in effect. However the first time I went to a Regional
| Burn (a mini-Burning-Man-esque offshoot event) and camped
| right in the middle of Tent City, I felt completely at ease.
| I was quite literally surrounded by my tribe, and it was a
| really comforting effect.
|
| It definitely made me ponder about Dunbar's number and what
| tribal life must be like.
|
| Coincidentally, the three demarcations at this particular
| burn, the theme camp (~30 people), the field/block (~100),
| and the whole burn (~500), correspond to the lower end of the
| types of groupings Dunbar observed.
|
| > Dunbar noted that the groups fell into three categories--
| small, medium and large, equivalent to bands, cultural
| lineage groups and tribes--with respective size ranges of
| 30-50, 100-200 and 500-2500 members each.
| THE_PUN_STOPS wrote:
| Anyone who has tried car/van camping in public should be
| familiar with this feeling. While sleeping in my van I've had
| plenty of nightmares where the nearest neighborhood forms an
| angry mob to have my vehicle towed away.
| The_rationalist wrote:
| What about the second night? The nth night? Can we plot that?
| ycombinete wrote:
| I've found it to be exponential. By the third night I'm
| sleeping fairly efficiently and effectively.
| mhb wrote:
| Related?: The left-cradling bias and its relationship with
| empathy and depression
| https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-42539-6
| loceng wrote:
| Does anyone know if research on this effect has been done in
| relation to sleep apnea test clinics?
| tomhoward wrote:
| From the article:
|
| "Sleep researchers discovered the "first-night effect" decades
| ago, when they began studying people in sleep labs. The first
| night in a lab, a person's sleep is usually so bad that
| researchers simply toss out any data they collect."
| loceng wrote:
| So my questions stems from that I had trouble sleeping as an
| early teenager and did a sleep study - and it was only one
| night. Are other sleep labs to check for sleep apnea or other
| problems generally multiple nights then? It sounds like
| they'd need to be to get accurate data.
| Pyramus wrote:
| I've interacted with a number of different sleep labs
| (Germany and UK). All physicians I've spoken to are well
| aware of the fact, however, the effect size of what they
| are typically looking for is greater than this 1st night
| effect. E.g. if you have sleep apnea it will (very likely)
| show up on the first night already.
|
| If your condition is more subtle (e.g. sleepwalking) they
| will already book you for two nights.
|
| In addition, there is a counter-effect where people are
| struggling for years with their condition and being in a
| sleep lab brings some form of 'being taken serious'.
| ycombinete wrote:
| I travel for work, sometimes for many hours accross many
| timezones; other times I'll only have to drive or fly for an hour
| or two. Regardless of the above, I've often felt that my sleep
| when I first get to a place only feels like it's about 60%
| effective.
| apohn wrote:
| I used to have a job with a very heavy travel load and had the
| same experience. First 2 nights at a new location was terrible,
| even if it was a really nice hotel.
|
| Some of the customers I used to work with had me visit them
| multiple times. After I had gotten used to a particular hotel
| (typically the second visit) I slept much better. Over multiple
| visits comes a basic level of familiarity with restaurants,
| roads, shops, etc and my level of stress dropped as well.
| ghaff wrote:
| It's hard for me to separate out the effect of air travel or a
| long drive from just sleeping in a different place. I suspect
| it's a little of both given that I would say that having
| trouble sleeping is more pronounced after a plane flight than a
| 3-5 hour drive. But being in a different place/different bed
| _can_ have an effect in both cases.
| ycombinete wrote:
| The low level stress and discomfort from the time I arrive at
| the airport, must have an effect. So much more goes into 2
| hours of flying vs 2 hours of driving (maybe even 4!).
| GordonS wrote:
| I have a different experience. I had to travel a lot for work
| for years, and always slept much _better_ while away. I think
| what made the difference for me is that hotels always (or
| almost always) have blackout blinds, so the room is pitch
| black.
| popotamonga wrote:
| Here is something strange. I have constant intestine issues, i go
| poop 4-10x a day, for 25 years now. Except when i go sleep in a
| new place like vacations, i wont poop for 4 days in a row.
| officialjunk wrote:
| it's normal, at least from my experience. i hypothesize it is
| related to being vulnerable to predators while stopping
| somewhere to poop in an unfamiliar environment.
|
| but it sounds like you are also eating something your body
| doesn't like. for example, before i discovered i was allergic
| to gluten, i would also poop dozens of small sessions per day.
| all that went away after doing an elimination diet
| (systematically introducing 1 new ingredient at a time until
| you find the problems).
| tpmx wrote:
| A more efficient method is a skin allergy test (skin prick
| test). It allows for testing lots of allergens in parallel.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skin_allergy_test
|
| A quick search shows that it works for gluten
| intolerance/celiac disease too.
|
| My mom went through this back in the 80s or so after having
| mysterious issues - turned out it was raw(ish) onion that was
| the culprit.
| danielheath wrote:
| Doesn't help with carbohydrate intolerances. If there's any
| carb structure your body can't crack apart, you will get
| those exact symptoms due to over feeding the microbiome.
| smlckz wrote:
| What have your doctor(s) said on your condition? Name of your
| medical condition?
| popotamonga wrote:
| Tests and tests,no one knows, i gave up on diagnosing, its
| none of the usual conditions. It gets better if i eat
| exclusively rice and water for a week but i cant be bothered
| to do that.
| Badfood wrote:
| Try researching SIBO
| chordalkeyboard wrote:
| I had gut issues and the tests didn't show anything, I went
| primal (like paleo but with dairy and using a blender to
| make shakes) and I'm fine now.
|
| I'd second the other comments and suggest you research
| SIBO, gluten intolerance, and fringe diets such as paleo;
| and do an elimination diet.
| curiousllama wrote:
| Every consultant has a favorite hotel chain. I've heard some say
| "i just sleep better in [Hiltons, Marriotts]"
|
| I wonder if this is part of the reason - familiar surroundings
| autoditype wrote:
| I bet this throws off sleep studies. I have trouble sleeping in
| new or strange places
| a3n wrote:
| > Rattenborg found that ducks with a bird on either side of them
| put their entire brain to sleep and kept both eyes closed.
| "However, the ducks at the end of the row slept more with one
| half of the brain at a time," he says. "And when they did that
| they directed the open eye away from the other birds, as if they
| were looking for approaching predators."
|
| When I park my semi truck in a truck parking lot in late
| afternoon or evening, if the space on either side is empty I
| leave my parking lights on, until both spaces are filled.
|
| And if I'm unlucky enough to park on the end of the row, I leave
| my parking lights on all night long. And go to sleep with half my
| brain awake.
| coldtea wrote:
| > _Rattenborg found that ducks with a bird on either side of
| them put their entire brain to sleep and kept both eyes closed.
| "However, the ducks at the end of the row slept more with one
| half of the brain at a time," he says._
|
| So it's better to sleep with two partners at a time? I've
| always maintained this to my spouse!
|
| > _When I park my semi truck in a truck parking lot in late
| afternoon or evening, if the space on either side is empty I
| leave my parking lights on, until both spaces are filled._
|
| So, how do you deal with one driving off early while you're
| sleeping? Or does that not traditionally happen?
| a3n wrote:
| I just hope for the best. There's only so much you can do.
| nightowl_games wrote:
| Tell me more about how you are a semi truck driver on hacker
| news. Where you once in the tech industry? Do you just find it
| interesting here?
| TheRealSteel wrote:
| I'm not them, but I'm a non-programmer on HN. I'd love to be
| a professional programmer but I'm simply too stupid. I
| continue to teach myself and learn in my spare time.
| nightowl_games wrote:
| Programming is really about persistence, focus and
| dedication. I'm not naturally very intelligent but I am
| extremely stubborn so I simply keep trying, keep reading,
| keep googling until I solve the problem.
| zebnyc wrote:
| I second what nightowl_games is saying. I hope you are not
| equating programming with an ability to crunch through
| leetcode problems. There is more to programming than that.
|
| There are plenty of companies out there which hire folks
| without putting them through the leetcode hazing ritual.
|
| Cheers
| mrtweetyhack wrote:
| I, for one, am happy you are learning. Always best to start
| a project and implement whatever you are learning. Best way
| to learn.
| a3n wrote:
| Used to be in tech. Rage quit my last tech job when I was
| past my fresh date.
| ubertoop wrote:
| Wow. I would love to hear more about this. A lot of people
| on here suffer from burnout in some form or another, and I
| would imagine very view actually cut the cord. Do you have
| a writeup anywhere about your experience?
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