Humans are one of the only species that don’t sleep for short periods throughout the day. If so many other species of animals have different sleep schedules, why don’t we do it like that? Work for a couple hours then take a nap in a 
continuous cycle. As you might assume, this would not be possible for most humans. Our world works in a way where you do as much you can in a day then sleep for as much time you have left. These animals are essentially just taking naps, but do naps benefit humans?
A benefit of napping is that after a short nap, you can wake up feeling more alert and responsive. A study done by myth busters showed that driving while you were drowsy is just as dangerous as driving while you were drunk. According to the Sleep Foundation, “Naps can restore alertness, enhance performance, and reduce mistakes and accidents. A study at NASA on sleepy military pilots and astronauts found that a 40-minute nap improved performance by 34% and alertness 100%.” The sleep organization also stated that napping is just a helpful getaway. It provides the body with relaxation and rejuvenation.
Even though there are all of these great benefits to taking a midday nap, there can be some drawbacks. According to Sleep expert Dr. Michael Breus ‘If you take it longer than 30 minutes, you end up in deep sleep. Have you ever taken a nap and felt worse when you woke up? That’s what’s happening — you’re sleeping too long and you’re going into a stage of sleep that’s very difficult to get out of.’
Dr. Breus is saying that the ideal nap time is no more than 30 minutes. If you exceed this amount of time, the nap wont be effective.
In summary, naps can be greatly beneficial in short lengths, but hurtful if you exceed the ideal time.
I found this blog to be very informative and interesting. I have read multiple blogs on napping and they all said to not exceed 30 minutes. While I understand that after 30 minutes, one feels groggy when waking up, I keep wondering if the nap is still beneficial. In your blog it said “Dr. Breus is saying that the ideal nap time is no more than 30 minutes. If you exceed this amount of time, the nap wont be effective” but I feel that the extra sleep should still help. Maybe not for alertness, but there are other benefits too.
This is a very good topic, it relates to our daily lives. Sometimes I will feel tired or can’t concentrate during class in the afternoon. I know it is useless to go to class when you are tired and you just go there and fall sleep. Nap is a very good option for me. I don;t have class after lunch, I think I can take a 30 minutes cap and try to work harder in the afternoon. Here is a website I found shows that napping is really good for us: WebMD
I can attest to taking naps every single day. In fact, if I don’t take a nap, especially with the lack of sleep that I have recently been receiving, my body does not function. Interestingly enough though, noted in your post, I agree with the concept that taking a nap for longer than thirty minutes feels absolutely awful. Well, at least when you wake up from it. I feel great going to sleep, however I can never dictate how long I want to nap for (even if I do set an alarm). I found in this article that taking a nap and feeling groggy and badly after you wake up is called sleep inertia. The article also goes to say that naps should be between 10 and 30 minutes because it will then limit the grogginess felt afterwards.
This is actually a topic that my AP Psychology class in high school discussed when we were learning about sleep and sleep disorders. This is a very important topic especially for us college students because we are constantly trying to cram in so many things into our days and weeks. Whether its clubs, orgs, and most importantly studying, we are draining ourselves out. I have never been one to take naps, but ever since I have been at college I do all the time. Like you said, naps have their benefits, but if you overdue them, you are going to be hurting yourself in the end. Check out this article from Psychology Today, it discusses a little bit more about what you talked about that you might find interesting. And to be honest, I’m probably going to take a nap today after Andrew’s lecture; let’s hope I don’t spend too much time sleeping!
Very interesting topic to me specifically because I am constantly taking naps in order to replenish my body on days where I do not get enough sleep or when I just have extra time. I completely agree that a nap longer than 30 minutes can actually make you feel worse because I have felt this. Every person is different regarding their sleep schedule, but it would be cool to learn about different studies that experimented with different length naps. By adding a couple resources that experimented with this, you can really show for sure that naps can be very beneficial in short lengths, but harmful if they are too long.
In regards to naps, I have a lot of personal experience with these. The other day I woke up at 5:30 with a lot of energy and felt great; but decided to go back to sleep and by 8am I felt so much more tired. It is always a struggle around 3pm-6pm on a week day to decide to nap, have coffee, or struggle through it and go to bed early. There are actually such things as shift workers where they record the quality of work vs. the workers and shifts that they are working on. Is this a productive way to run a business or factory? Examine scientific article here: http://hfs.sagepub.com/content/24/6/629.short