YES says Matthew Walker, author* and professor of neuroscience and psychology
Do we really need to sleep more?
*Sleeplessness: Assessing Sleep Need In Society Today by Jim Horne (Palgrave Macmillan, £20.99), Why We Sleep: The New Science Of Sleep And Dreams by Matthew Walker (Penguin, £9.99). Compiled by Laura Potter. Photograph: iStock
‘A 1940s Gallup survey found that the average adult was sleeping almost eight hours a night. Now the average is six hours and 31 minutes. It took Mother Nature 3.6 million years to determine eight hours’ sleep a necessity, and within 80 years we’ve lopped off 25 per cent. A vast proportion of people are sleeping well below that average, and it’s having a marked consequence on our health and productivity.