Hi, this is Your Health, Quickly, a Scientific American podcast series!

大家好，欢迎来到《科学美国人》播客系列节目《健康快讯》!

We bring you the latest vital health news: discoveries that affect your body and your mind.

我们将为大家带来最新健康要闻：影响人们身心健康的发现。

And we break down the medical research to help you stay healthy.

我们将分析医学研究，帮助大家保持健康。

I’m Tanya Lewis. I’m Josh Fischman. We’re Scientific American’s senior health editors.

我是谭雅·刘易斯。我是乔希·费什曼。我们是《科学美国人》的高级健康编辑。

Today’s show is about power naps.

今天的节目要讲的是有效打盹(浅度睡眠)。

Turns out a short daytime snooze can sharpen your mind—if you do it for the right amount of time.

研究证明，如果时间长短合适的话，白天打一会儿盹可以让你的思维更敏捷。

Did you know that in the U.S. it is against the rules to nap in a federal government building?

你知道在美国联邦政府大楼里打盹是违反规定的吗?

No, I didn’t! There are actually rules about that?

我不知道! 居然有这样的规定吗?

Yeah. In 2019 the federal agency in charge of buildings said there would be no sleeping on the premises.

是的。2019年，掌管政府大楼的联邦机构表示，禁止在办公场所睡觉。

Wow, that’s harsh. Then again, I think most people, at least most adults, look down on naps somewhat. Naps are things that babies do.

哇，太严苛了。而且，我认为大多数人，至少大多数成年人，都有点看不起打盹。打盹是婴儿的行为。

But what if I told you that short daytime naps for adults can sharpen the mind, help you solve problems and make you more productive? They improve your mood, too.

但是，如果我告诉你，成年人白天打一会儿盹可以让思维变得敏捷，有助于解决问题，变得更有效率，你会怎么想? 而且小睡也能改善心情。

That makes sense—power naps are definitely a thing. But it still seems kind of taboo at work, at least in the U.S.

这是有道理的——有效打盹绝对很普遍。但在工作中打盹似乎仍然是一种禁忌，至少在美国是这样。

Does it really boost your brain, though? You’re not just saying that because you like naps, right?

打盹真的能增强大脑吗? 你这么说不是因为你喜欢打盹吧?

I would like a quick snooze sometimes. But actually I’m saying that because scientists are learning these are real effects.

有时我确实想打一会儿盹。但实际上，我这么说是因为科学家们正在研究这些真实的效果。

And you and I have a colleague who looked into this.

我们有一个同事对此进行过调查。

That’s right—Lydia Denworth, Scientific American’s Science of Health columnist.

没错，她就是莉迪亚·登沃斯，她是《科学美国人》健康科学专栏的作家。

Yep, Lydia. Her upcoming column is about naps. She got interested in this because she finds quick daytime naps really helpful.

是的, 莉迪亚。她即将推出的专栏是关于打盹的。她对打盹颇有兴趣，因为她发现白天打会儿盹真的很有帮助。

And I asked her about that.

我问了她这样的问题。

Hi Lydia, thanks for waking up and joining us.

嗨，莉迪亚，谢谢你睡醒后参加我们的节目。

I'm glad to be here, Josh.

很高兴能参加节目，乔什。

Now you've told me that you take a nap, right?

你跟我说过你会打盹，对吧?

I do, just about every day.

是的，几乎每天都会。

And you're not ashamed!

你不觉得羞耻!

Not anymore. I'm opening up about my nap habit.

再也不羞耻了。我要坦白我的打盹习惯。

Why aren’t you ashamed anymore?

为什么你不再感到羞耻了?

Well, because the science shows that my napping is virtuous. There is real power to napping.

因为科学证明打盹是有益的。而且打盹真正有效。

And though it does depend how long you do it and when you do it and a bunch of things, my napping turns out to fit right in the sweet spot.

虽然这确实取决于你睡了多长时间，什么时候睡，以及其他多个因素，但最终发现我的打盹正好与最佳时间相符。

And so now I feel quite pleased that I have the ability to nap and that it refreshes me in the way that I always felt that it did.

现在我很高兴我有打盹的能力，这会让我恢复精神，就像我一直觉得和体验的那样。

I’m glad Lydia is taking the shame out of napping. So what’s the sweet spot for naps? Ten minutes? An hour?

我很高兴莉迪亚摆脱了打盹的羞耻感。那么打盹的最佳时间是多久呢? 十分钟? 一个小时?

Well, the idea is that the best way to nap is to nap for just maybe 20 to 30 minutes and to do it before 5 P.M. if you keep regular daytime hours so it doesn't interfere with your nocturnal sleep.

这个观点认为，打盹的最佳时间是20到30分钟，如果你保持正常的白天作息，那么最好在下午5点前打盹，这样就不会干扰你晚上睡觉。

And the reason that 20 to 30 minutes is good has to do with where you are in sleep cycles during that time.

20到30分钟是最佳时间的原因是，这个时间与你在这段时间内处于睡眠周期的哪个阶段有关。

So most of your sleep in 20 minutes will be light sleep, N1, and it makes it easier to wake up.

大部分20分钟内的睡眠都是浅睡眠，这时处于N1阶段，会更容易醒来。

If you sleep longer, you will go into a deeper phase of sleep that can be harder to wake up from.

如果睡得时间更长些，就会进入难以醒来的深度睡眠阶段。

That definitely rings true to me. I don’t take naps that often. But when I do, I sometimes nap for too long and wake up feeling pretty groggy!

这对我来说绝对是真的。我不经常打盹。但当我打盹时，我有时会睡得很久，醒来时感觉头晕脑胀!

So what are the benefits of these shorter naps?

那么这些较短时间的打盹有什么好处呢？

You improve your memory, your information processing, your vigilance, which in scientific terms is your ability to respond to something sudden, like a swerving car.

会提高记忆力、信息处理能力、警惕性，用科学术语来说，就是提高你对突发事件(如，遇到突然转向的汽车)的应对能力。

And there's a bunch of other ways in which it improves your mental acuity, but those are the things that show up most strongly.

还有很多其他的方法可以提高精神敏锐度，但打盹这样的方法效果最明显。

That makes sense. I know they say if you’re tired while driving, you should pull over and take a short nap. But I didn’t know about the memory effect.

这是有道理的。我知道有人说如果你开车累了，你应该停在路边打一会儿盹，但我不知道对记忆也有影响。

If you take a 20 or 30 minute nap at, say, 1 P.M., it will actually improve your memory?

如果在下午1点小睡20到30分钟，真的会提高记忆力吗?

Yes, it will improve your recall in the subsequent hour or two after the nap.

是的，在小睡后的一两个小时内会提高记忆力。

And so if you wake up feeling like, “Hey, I feel better able to do my work now,” you're not wrong.

如果一觉醒来觉得现在能更好地工作了，你的感觉没有错。

How did scientists figure this out? Did they have people take naps and then measure their recall?

科学家们是怎么发现的? 科学家们是否会在人们小睡后测量他们的记忆力？

That’s exactly what researchers have been doing.

这正是研究人员一直在做的事情。

Two of them are Ruth Leong and Michael Chee of the National University of Singapore.

其中两位研究人员是新加坡国立大学的露丝·梁(Ruth Leong)和迈克尔·陈（Michael Chee）。

They work at the Center for Sleep and Cognition there.

他们在这所大学的睡眠与认知中心工作。

And in a 2022 study, they found the kind of cognitive benefits to short naps that Lydia was talking about.

在2022年的一项研究中，他们发现了莉迪亚谈到的小睡对认知的好处。

Also, a nap simply makes people feel better, they learned.

此外，他们还发现，小睡会让人感觉更好。

Chee says that sleep scientists don’t talk about mood enough.

陈认为睡眠科学家对情绪的讨论还不够。

But he and Leong have found, not surprisingly, that tired people are grumpy people. Quick nappers, though, are nicer.

但他和梁发现，疲劳会使人脾气暴躁，这并不足为奇。不过，短暂小睡会使人友善些。

We could all use a bit more niceness, that’s for sure. But not everything about napping is good.

我们都可以通过小睡变得更友善些，这毋庸置疑。但小睡并不是只有益处。

Frequent and longer daytime naps might actually be a sign of health problems, right?

白天频繁打盹和长时间小睡实际上可能是存在健康问题的征兆，对吗?

Yeah, Lydia talked about that.

是的，莉迪亚对此进行过讨论。

High blood pressure, metabolic syndrome—which is the combination of high blood pressure, high cholesterol and other metabolic problems—obesity, Alzheimer's, brain inflammation, is linked to sleeping more, even in young people. So a whole host of things.

高血压、代谢综合征(即高血压、高胆固醇和其他代谢问题的结合)、肥胖、阿尔茨海默氏症以及脑部炎症，这些都与睡眠过多有关，即使对年轻人也是如此。真的存在一大堆的问题。

So longer naps—like, more than 30 minutes—several times a day could be a sign that there’s an underlying health problem. And you should probably see a doctor.

超过30分钟的更长时间的小睡，或者一天睡几次，可能标志着身体存在着潜在的健康问题，应该去看医生。

Exactly.

说得没错。

But those quick power naps—the kind that Lydia is talking about—could be a really good thing.

不过，莉迪亚所说的那种有效小睡可能真的有好处。

And there’s evidence that they might even improve creativity and problem-solving.

有证据表明，有效小睡甚至可以提高创造力和解决问题的能力。

You’re talking about the Thomas Edison napping research.

你说的是托马斯·爱迪生的打盹研究。

That's right! Edison famously didn’t like to sleep. He thought it was a waste of thinking time.

没错! 爱迪生是出了名的不爱睡觉。他认为睡觉是在浪费思考时间。

So when he got tired in his lab, he would sit down and hold a ball in his hand.

当他在实验室累了的时候，他会坐下来，手里拿着一个球。

When he started to relax and doze off, he’d drop the ball. The noise would wake him up.

当他开始放松和打瞌睡时，球会从手里掉下来。球落地的声音会把他吵醒。

And he thought he actually solved invention problems during that twilight state.

他认为他在这种半睡半醒状态下解决了许多发明问题。

Modern researchers tried to recreate this, didn’t they? To see if he was right?

现代研究人员试图重现这种情形，不是吗? 看看爱迪生说的是否属实?

Yeah, they did, but with a bit of twist. A few years ago some researchers in Paris recruited volunteers to try this. They replaced Edison's ball with a water bottle.

对，他们照做了，不过有些调整。几年前，法国巴黎的一些研究人员招募了一些志愿者来进行尝试。他们把爱迪生的球换成了水瓶。

That probably made a loud thump if it hit the floor!

如果它落到地上，可能会发出一声巨响!

It would wake me up for sure!

它肯定会把我吵醒的!

Anyway, before people lay down, holding the bottle in their hand, the scientists gave them a math problem, which they couldn't solve.

科学家会给志愿者出一道数学题，志愿者没有解出来，随后，研究人员让志愿者手里握着水瓶躺下睡觉。

And then they had people lay down holding the bottle, and put electrodes on their head to check which phase of sleep they ended up in.

志愿者手里握着水瓶躺下睡觉，把电极戴在他们的头上，以检查他们最后进入了哪个睡眠阶段。

Some people lightly dozed off and dropped the bottle.

有些志愿者浅浅打起了盹，把瓶子掉在了地上。

When those people woke up, the researchers asked them to tackle the math problem again. And a lot of those people got it right.

这些志愿者醒来后，研究人员要求他们再次解那道数学题，最终很多人解出来了。

People who didn't drift off enough to drop the bottle or who went into a deeper, heavier phase of sleep—they still had trouble with the math problem.

有些志愿者并没入睡到足以让水瓶掉落下来，还有些志愿者进入了更深、更熟的睡眠阶段，他们都没能解出那道数学题。

That’s fascinating.

太有趣了。

Yeah it is! Scientific American published an article about it two years ago.

是啊!《科学美国人》两年前发表了一篇关于打盹的文章。

So if you want to learn more details, we’ll put a link to it in the transcript for this episode.

如果你想了解更多细节，我们会在本期节目的文字记录中提供相关链接。

Ok, now, would we know the power of napping, which one of us goes to our bosses to ask for some beds and couches in the office?

好，现在，我们知道打盹的效果了，我们谁去找老板申请在办公室放床和沙发?

Great idea. I’m on board.

好主意，我赞同。

Purely for business reasons. More productivity. Better podcasts!

纯粹是出于商业原因，为了提高生产力，为了做出更好的播客!

Exactly.

一点没错。

Your Health, Quickly is produced by Tulika Bose, Jeff DelViscio, Kelso Harper, Carin Leong, and by us.

《健康快讯》 栏目由图里卡·博斯、杰夫·德尔维西奥、凯尔索·哈珀、卡林·梁制作，我们也参与了制作。

It’s edited by Elah Feder and Alexa Lim. Our music is composed by Dominic Smith.

本期栏目由以拉·菲德尔和亚历克莎·林编辑，由多米尼克·史密斯编曲。

Our show is a part of Scientific American’s podcast, Science, Quickly.

我们的节目是《科学美国人》播客“科学快播”的一部分。

Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. If you like the show, give us a rating or review!

无论你从哪里收听播客，都可以订阅我们的节目。如果你喜欢本期节目，请给我们评分、留言吧!

And if you have a topic you want us to cover, you can email us at Yourhealthquickly@sciam.com. That’s your health quickly at S-C-I-A-M dot com.

如果大家对我们报道的话题有什么想法，请发邮件至Yourhealthquickly@sciam.com。

I’m Tanya Lewis. And I’m Josh Fischman. See you next time.

我是谭雅·刘易斯，我是乔希·费什曼。我们下期节目见。

来源：Scientific American