A new scientific study now proves it: a woman’s brain has a more complex network, works harder, and therefore requires longer sleep at night. The result: women need more sleep than men. But how much and why exactly?
Women need an average of 20 more minutes of sleep.
The amount of sleep a person needs is partly genetic. Researchers recommend around seven to nine hours a night. Those who sleep less and feel fit, generally it is because they have already become accustomed to fatigue, however this weakens both the body and the mind. It takes your body and brain seven to nine hours to fully recover from the stresses of everyday life.
The consequences of not getting enough sleep: you feel bored and tired, concentration is difficult, and performance is noticeably reduced. But in the long run, lack of sleep can have even worse consequences in the form of serious mental illnesses – burnout syndrome, depression, anxiety disorders, just to name a few.
Getting enough sleep, seven to nine hours a night, is important for your mental and physical health. But within our society, have you ever noticed that women always need to sleep longer than men?
That the man on Saturday morning perhaps is already preparing breakfast, while the woman is still sleeping peacefully in bed? Or that when the alarm goes off, the woman complains of being tired while the man feels fit and relaxed? This is no reason to be upset that women need 20 minutes more sleep on average than men.
Female brains work harder and have a more complex network, which is why they need to sleep longer.
And it also directly provides the proper explanation: women’s brains are more complex and networked and therefore work harder than men. Therefore, they need more regeneration at night to replenish their “energy reserves.” More precisely: about 20 more minutes.
The different functions of brains are evolutionary.
To say that women work harder and create more complex connections is to mean nothing more and nothing less than multitasking. Although women may not necessarily have a “better” ability to multitask than men, as described in the following article, their brains are more or less programmed to master multiple tasks at the same time, or to “scan” and process a wide range of tasks range of information at the same time.
The reason for this can be found in evolution: while men were primarily responsible for acquiring food and protecting the tribe, women had to clean and cook at the same time, as well as caring for the sick and caring for to the kids. Especially the last point plays an important role here: a mother must always and completely independent of her current activity watch over her child.
Every moment in which she is neglected can be deadly for her offspring. The willingness to multitask in the female brain is therefore directly related to the “traditional role” of women.
The “multitasking” characteristic in this case means more links between the two cerebral hemispheres in women, while in men more connections are often found within the individual cerebral hemispheres. The brains of men and women are simply different online.
Therefore, women are not necessarily (more) capable of doing more than one task at the same time, but they have a different way of collecting and processing information due to their intended parenting role.
Women find it difficult to sleep longer as they often wake up easier than men, and suffer more.
It is precisely this traditional distribution of roles that brings with it another peculiarity of women, which leads to the need to sleep longer: waking up at night to the crying of children, women sleep less soundly than men and wake up more often at night. It is no wonder that women especially often have to struggle with sleep disorders.
The problem is that a study found that women suffer more from these sleep disorders than men. They develop more rapid health problems, such as long-term stress, hostility, depression, anxiety, or anger.
So dear woman, you don’t have to “keep up” with your partner. Go to bed 20 minutes earlier at night or stay an extra half hour in the morning. Therefore, at least there will be no disputes about who uses the bathroom first and you will start to be fit, healthy and full of energy and performance in the workday, and not only today, but permanently.