Is an Afternoon Nap Really Beneficial?

Wednesday 4th April 2012

There are many different tips for sleeping well and feeling more alert and productive during the day. Many articles state that an afternoon nap will help you to feel more awake in the afternoon and improve your sleep during the night. However some argue that an afternoon nap can make you feel more tired and lethargic and prevent you from sleeping during the night, stopping you from regulating your sleep. So is an afternoon nap really beneficial to our sleeping patters, or does it in fact hinder our ability to achieve a beneficial sleep routine? Every individual is different so there may be other factors that depend on whether your afternoon nap is beneficial.

If you are not getting enough hours during the night, an afternoon nap may help you to regain energy for the rest of the day however naps to do not necessarily make up for an inadequate sleep. A short nap or power nap of 20 to 30 minutes can help to improve mood, performance and make you more alert. According to the National Sleep Foundation there are three types of napping:

Planned napping
This is when you sleep before you actually become tired, people can do this if they know they are going to be up later than usual or a change to their routine means they will be receiving less sleep in a defence to feeling tired.

Emergency napping
This is when you feel really tired and need to nap in order to feel awake again. Emergency napping can be effective for overcoming tiredness and is recommended during intervals of long driving periods.

Habitual napping
This is when someone takes a nap at the same time every day. It is often in the afternoon and is common in children and elderly people.

Napping is a large aspect of many cultures, in Spanish culture many workers, school children and shop owners have a siesta every afternoon when the sun is too hot and this is short napping period which would be classed as habitual napping, this may benefit many people in Spanish culture as they have adopted a regular sleep schedule that includes napping.

 A short nap can be beneficial but any longer than the recommended 20-30 minutes and you can feel groggy, tired and lethargic making you feel worse than before the nap. When you sleep for longer than this amount of time you are entering a much deeper sleep phase which can be a lot more difficult to wake up from. If you need to nap during the day it is also important to ensure that you do it early afternoon so that you can get to sleep when it comes to bedtime. Therefore the amount of time that you nap for and the time of day that you do it has a huge influence on whether or not it is beneficial. 
 

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