Sleeping Comforts

Side profile of a young woman sleeping on a bed

Almost everyone finds it easier to go to sleep in their own rooms, rather than new places. Scientists, according to an article tweeted by cardiologist Eric Topol, have been researching the reasons behind this “first night” effect where people often have trouble sleeping or sleep improperly in unfamiliar surroundings.

Dr Yuka Sasaki from Brown University set out to research this phenomenon and found that this has something to do with the way humans have evolved. According to Dr Sasaki, almost all other animals like dolphins and birds only put half their brain to sleep out of fear of predators. So she tested her hypothesis that humans did the same when they were sleeping in unfamiliar surroundings, which is why they woke up tired and restless the morning after.

Dr Sasaki ran the experiment by inviting college students to sleep in her lab, and studied their breathing and brainwaves to see how they slept. She found that the left hemisphere of the brain indeed stayed up during the night, so much so, it would often wake up the other half of the brain if it felt there were odd noises coming (which Dr Sasaki introduced). So she published her research concluding that the first night effect is sort of the night-watchman of the human brain which keeps us alert when we’re sleeping in new locations in order to keep us safe.