Sleep on this
A field experiment suggests that a longer night’s sleep doesn’t necessarily improve your life.

Most of us feel that getting more sleep does us good, but a new study suggests that the reality is more complicated.
The researchers studied 452 low-income workers in Chennai, India, at home during their normal routines—and managed to increase their sleep by about half an hour per night. The impact on their productivity, earnings, financial choices, sense of well-being, and blood pressure: zip.
The only effect, apparently, was to lower the number of hours they worked.
“To our surprise, these night-sleep interventions had no positive effects whatsoever on any of the outcomes we measured,” says coauthor Frank Schilbach, an MIT economist.
One thing to bear in mind, though, is that participants tended to sleep in difficult circumstances. “In Chennai, you can see people sleeping on their rickshaws,” says Schilbach. “Often, there are four or five people sleeping in the same room, where it’s loud and noisy. You see people sleep in between road segments next to a highway. It’s incredibly hot even at night, and there are lots of mosquitos.” On average, participants woke up 31 times per night.
That leaves open the possibility that helping people sleep more soundly, rather than just longer, could be useful. The research also showed that daytime naps improved productivity, executive function, and psychological well-being, though total income didn’t increase because nappers spent less time actually working.
“It’s not the case that naps pay for themselves,” Schilbach says. Still, he adds, “I think a good night’s sleep is also important in and of itself. We should value being able to afford to sleep well and not be worried at night.”
Keep Reading
Most Popular
A Roomba recorded a woman on the toilet. How did screenshots end up on Facebook?
Robot vacuum companies say your images are safe, but a sprawling global supply chain for data from our devices creates risk.
A startup says it’s begun releasing particles into the atmosphere, in an effort to tweak the climate
Make Sunsets is already attempting to earn revenue for geoengineering, a move likely to provoke widespread criticism.
10 Breakthrough Technologies 2023
These exclusive satellite images show that Saudi Arabia’s sci-fi megacity is well underway
Weirdly, any recent work on The Line doesn’t show up on Google Maps. But we got the images anyway.
Stay connected
Get the latest updates from
MIT Technology Review
Discover special offers, top stories, upcoming events, and more.