Sapere

A company in Japan is paying its employees to get a full night’s sleep.

Bloomberg reports a wedding organizer in Japan called “Crazy Inc.” is awarding points to employees who sleep six hours a night or more for at least five days a week.

Points can be exchanged for food in the company cafeteria.

Nightly rest is tracked using an app.

According to a Japanese survey more than 90 percent of people there over the age of 20 say that they don’t get enough sleep.

SLEEP DISORDER

The amount of sleep a person needs depends on many factors, including age. In general:

• Infants (ages 0-3 months) require 14-17 hours a day.
• Infants (ages 4-11 months) require 12-15 hours a day
• Toddlers (ages 1-2 years) require about 11-14 hours a day.
• Pre-school children (ages 3-5) require 10-13 hours a day.
• School-age children (ages 6-13) require 9-11 hours a day.
• Teenagers (ages 14-17) need about 8-10 hours each day.
• Most adults need 7 to 9 hours a night for the best amount of sleep, although some people may need as few as 6 hours or as many as 10 hours of sleep each day.
• Older adults (ages 65 and older)need 7-8 hours of sleep each day.
• Women in the first 3 months of pregnancy often need several more hours of sleep than usual.

However, experts say that if you feel drowsy during the day, even during boring activities, you haven’t had enough sleep.

Sleep Debt

The amount of sleep a person needs also increases if he or she has been deprived of sleep in previous days. Getting too little sleep creates a “sleep debt,” which is much like being overdrawn at a bank. Eventually, your body will demand that the debt be repaid.

We don’t seem to adapt to getting less sleep than we need. While we may get used to a sleep-depriving schedule, our judgment, reaction time, and other functions are still impaired.

Consequences of Too Little Sleep

Too little sleep may cause:

• Memory problems
• Feeling depressed
• A weakening of your immune system, increasing your chance of becoming sick
• Increase in perception of pain