Changes in Sleep with Age - Term Paper Example

This sleep is usually characterized by more movements. As one grows up to become a teenager, he becomes more and more of an evening type (ET) or night owl. The reason for this may be obvious like the need to socialize or perhaps the lack of time to do it during the day as most teenagers would go to school at daytime. The fact that teenagers are night owls is usually evident in night clubs as one usually finds mostly teenagers in these places at around 11:00 pm or even as late as 3:00 am. However, the problem that teenagers have with their begin evening types is that they tend to have no normal or regular sleeping habits and may not feel good waking up in the morning.

On the other hand, teenagers may be able to tolerate work shifts and jet lag better than their parents and grandparents. Teenagers, however, compared to adults and younger children, tend to experience chronic sleep deprivation. The evidence is in the frequent occurrence of sleepiness among students. The pressures of school and university may be responsible for this. High school students may be sleep-deprived but college students are worse, although they tend to adjust to this sleeping habit better as they become sophomores.

The typical college freshman usually feels very sleepy during the day and may take several naps to compensate for this drowsiness. When people get to their middle age, they tend to get sleepier because they sleep less well compared to when they were still younger. There may be several factors that bring about this change such as the demands of work that may have finally taken its toll on one’s sleeping patterns. Workers, who are usually in their middle age, tend to overcome the desire to sleep late and thus force themselves to sleep early and wake up early too in order not to be late for work.

Naps may be common among adults at this age in order to compensate for the lack of sleep they tend to get in a busy working day. Nevertheless, this particular sleeping pattern that one forces on himself may eventually become indelible in his brain and will thus become his sleeping habit as he gets old. One then tends to become a morning type (MT) as he gets old. Although middle-aged people tend to become morning types because of the pressures of work, this is not usually the case. For some, the sleepiness during the night is not caused by work or pressures of work but with a sleepy personality.

Some soldiers, for example, while on night guard duty, tend to fall asleep many times. The reason is not necessarily the pressures of work as these soldiers tend to make up for their sleep during the day. However, some people simply tend to be sleepier compared to others. Pregnancy is also another factor that influences sleep among middle-aged women. The hormonal and metabolic changes as well as the physical discomfort that a pregnant woman experiences all contribute to several changes in sleep.

The result is several instances of sleep disturbance as well as sleepiness among pregnant women. The latter is naturally caused by the hormone progesterone, which is naturally produced in greater amounts during pregnancy. Menopausal women, on the other hand, due to the decrease in the production of estrogen and progesterone, have a tendency to have hot flashes during sleep, which in turn can make these women wake up several times in one night.