Regularly finding time for a little snooze is good for our brain and helps keep it bigger for longer, say University College London researchers.
The team showed nappers’ brains were 15 cubic centimetres (0.9 cubic inches) larger - equivalent to delaying ageing by between three and six years.
However, the scientists recommend keeping naps to less than half an hour.
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Cause and effect determination seems almost impossible, unless you you do a study whereby you tell a random group of people to nap and another random group of people not to nap and then compare the results after some time. There are so many possible causal relationships that make any strong conclusions very difficult, like:
- People that do very demanding mental work might be more inclined to take a nap.
- Smart people that make lots of money and are in a position of power can afford to sleep on the job more likely then let’s say a factory worker.
- People that have sleeping problems at night may be more likely to nap during the day. However some of the troubled sleepers may actually also be less likely to nap during the day because sleeping for them is difficult at all times of the day regardless of how tired they are.
- stressed people may find it more difficult to nap then chill people.
Science is often used to push a political agenda and this raises the question what possible agenda is behind this science. Sleeping on the job for example is easier when you work at home, something that has been promoted very heavily the last couple of years. It is only a matter of time before most people are connected to the metaverse and you can work and sleep at the same time.
Big brains get tired from the isometric exertion of pressing up against cranial walls all day long.
;D
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So the size of your brain possibly makes you more likely to want to nap and also possibly napping doesn’t effect the size of your brain.
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Agree, a randomized double-blind test based on clear hypotheses would be far more conclusive and determine cause-effect. But when it is not practical, observational studies can help pinpoint specific areas worthwhile for further study with perhaps more targeted and better defined tests.
Regarding the articles themselves, the second article has many more details than the first.
We analysed data from 378,932 people aged 40-69 who had participated in the UK Biobank study (a large-scale biomedical database) We only studied people with white European ancestry, as they accounted for more than 80% of the participants of the Biobank study.
Given that the test is limited to the UK, with people of white European ancestry as the only test subjects, there are probably numerous biases introduced. I suppose the benefit with the limitations they used is that it could help eliminate red herring variables. But it is too bad they did not compare with other types of ancestry and with other regions including those where an afternoon nap/siesta is encouraged by the culture. Even with the limitations of the design, it is possible there is a “there” there.
From what I read in the articles, I am not convinced there is enough evidence to justify policy changes. However, if an afternoon nap could make a significant difference in the quality and length of life, it would be a mistake to assume it is just an attempt to give political justification for lazy people to “work” at home. The only way to know for sure is … more research.
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This feels like circular reasoning to me. The whole point is, as you appear to agree with, that the study doesn’t show convincingly the benefits of napping whatever they may be. If you had perfect knowledge of those benefits then you wouldn’t have to make much assumtions any more.
The political justification for lazy people to “work” at home, may not be about lazy people. The efficiency of home workers is likely to be different from office workers (I’m assuming that forklift drivers are not working at home in large at this moment 
, but they may be in the future using remote control technology), however what group is “better” may depend on many variables and I’m not totally convinced either way. A legislative push for napping on the job and indirectly for home working may benefit big companies at the expense of smaller companies; smaller companies tend to struggle more with most kinds of bureaucracy then big companies. Also the world wide agenda for less car ownership/driving goes happily along with the working at home movement.