The Health & Rewards of Getting Your Beauty Sleep

Full Article

Axelsson, J., Sundelin, T., Ingre, M., Van Someren, E. J., & Olsson, A.et. al (2010, October 22). Beauty sleep: experimental study on the perceived health and attractiveness of sleep deprived people, 341(14) 1-5. Retrieved February 07, 2017, from http://www.bmj.com/content/bmj/341/bmj.c6614.full.pdf

Sleep Deprived - A decrease or absence of sleep from a person’s routine

Untrained (observer) - Unbiased perspective in order to produce a fair rating

Visual Analogue Scale - A psychometric response scale based on the observer/reporter’s perspective

Introduction

Sleep is known with a common familiarity between humans and animals as a time of rest and regeneration, setting many psychological boundaries as well as establishing physical health and correct behavioral functionality. As the common phrase “beauty sleep” implies, being well-rested has an apparent effect on one’s physical character, normally for the better. While previously this ideology lacked definitive scientific evidence, it is often visually obvious to passers by. The biological significance of sleep is thought to provoke a positive interpretation of restful signs in others.

This experiment poses great importance to society as a result of the increasingly clock-round activity of modern life, as many sleep-related disorders are becoming diagnosed at an alarming rate, in addition to many burdening diseases that are likely related to sleep deprivation.

Hypothesis - Based on common perception of beauty and acceptance, it was hypothesized that well-rested participants would exhibit numerous visual advantages compared to sleep deprived participants.

Methods

    23 healthy patients with normal sleep cycles and lacking insomnia or other sleep-related diseases were the focus of the experiment. Participants were gathered through advertising at four universities in Stockholm. Smokers or those who had consumed alcohol in the two days prior were forbidden to participate. After a full 8 hours of sleep, the participants were individually photographed after 7 hours awake. The participants slept in their own homes and confirmed their sleep cycles through sending text messages at their time of going to sleep and waking up.

Participants would proceed to visit the laboratory 2 hours prior to photography to avoid excessive exposure to sunlight or weather effects. In the photographs, participants’ hair was loose or combed back and they could not wear makeup or any cosmetic products. Photographs were taken in a well-lit facility with even lighting for all shots.

Afterwards, participants slept on average 5.03 hours that night and were then monitored in the sleep laboratory for the next 31 hours of wakefulness. The same photography procedures were then taken. The photographers were almost completely oblivious to the experimental background.

65 observers then looked at the 46 photographs without any knowledge of the experiment which had taken place. Each picture was rated on visual scales of beauty (unattractive to very attractive), health (very sick/unhealthy to very healthy) and tiredness (not at all tired to very tired).

Results and Analysis

    On average, when sleep deprived, people were rated as less healthy, more tired, and less attractive than after a normal night’s sleep. Compared to the normal sleep conditioned photographs, attractiveness and health were lower by roughly 4% and 6%, respectively, with tiredness increasing by 19% as shown in Table 1 through calculating the differences between the numerical data of normal sleep and sleep deprivation. Table 2 intends to show the correlation between sleep deprivation and average decrease in appearance. A 10 mm increase in tiredness was associated with a −3.0 mm change in health, a 10 mm increase in health increased attractiveness by 2.4 mm, and a 10 mm increase in tiredness reduced attractiveness by 1.2 mm (mm = visual analogue scale measurement). Table 2 shows that each variable affects/predicts another.

Table 1

  Multilevel mixed effects regression on effect of how sleep deprived people are perceived with respect to attractiveness, health, and tiredness

*Wald test.

†Evaluated using likelihood ratio test. Observers’ perceptions were rated using visual analogue scales of 100 mm, with 100 as the highest score. P=0.001 for all random effects.

Table 2

 Associations between health, tiredness, and attractiveness