Effects of Sleep Deprivation

Sleep deprivation is a difficult subjective experience to cope with, and shiftworkers can be particularly affected. At the subjective level, the effects of sleep deprivation can include  

Aside from the subjective experience of sleep debt and fatigue, the objective performance of the individual also suffers. The HSE (2006) noted that this applies particularly to tasks that require  

Vigilance and monitoring Decision making Awareness Fast reaction time Tracking ability Memory 

These are all relevant, to varying degrees, to the control room work setting, thus the aim of appropriately designed shiftwork arrangements and provisions is to specifically address these issues. 

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Elsinore and colleagues,55 while examining the impairing effects of sleep deprivation, demonstrated that subjects find Synwork to be more interesting and demanding than a sequentially administered PAB-like version, but performance engendered by Synwork is less sensitive to the effects of sleep deprivation than the same tasks presented simultaneously. 

The MSLT has been utilized in many studies to examine the effects of sleep deprivation on daytime sleepiness. As described earlier, Carskadon and Dement (11) performed the first MSLT study to test the effects of two nights of sleep loss in six young subjects. The scores fell to about 1 min at 0600 on the first night of sleep loss and remained at similarly low values throughout the sleep loss period. After one night of recovery sleep the scores remained significantly below baseline levels, which were not achieved until after the second recovery night. 

The effect of sleep deprivation on different age groups has also been tested using the MSLT. Sleep loss in young adolescents was assessed by examining the effects of one night s sleep loss in 12 subjects whose ages ranged from 11.7 to 14.6 years. MSLTs showed a marked reduction of sleep-onset latency from 0530... 

Table 1 Criteria for a Neurocognitive Assay for Assessing the Effects of Sleep Deprivation...

The theoretical and practical utility of any putative cognitive test of the effects of sleep deprivation must be grounded in its demonstrated sensitivity to known neurobiological sources of elevated sleep drive. The following sections review the sensitivity of the PVT to such factors. 

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Many studies have examined the effects of sleep deprivation on performance (e.g., Refs. 4-10). Narrative reviews of these and many other sleep deprivation studies have concluded that sleep deprivation negatively affects performance but that the extent of the decrement depends on the type of performance task, the length of the task, and the rate at which the task must be completed (11-14). Furthermore, two meta-analytic reviews examining the effect of sleep deprivation on performance resulted in similar conclusions (15,16). 

Unfortunately, the effects of sleep deprivation on subjective experiences or verbal reports are much less well understood. The potential effect of sleep depri-... 

Perhaps the most common type of verbal report used in sleep deprivation studies is a measure of subjective sleepiness. Subjective sleepiness is generally assessed by self-report scales (see also Chap. 1), such as the Stanford Sleepiness Scale (19), the Epworth Sleepiness Scale (20), visual analog scales (21), and the vigor and fatigue subscales on the Profile of Mood States (POMS Educational and Industrial Testing Service, San Diego, CA). These measures have been used in studies on the effects of sleep deprivation (22-25), shift work (26-28), and sleep disorders (29,30). 

The relationship between subjective sleepiness and performance is only one method of examining potential relationships between how individuals perceive the effects of sleep deprivation on their ability to function. Another method is to examine how capable sleep-deprived individuals are of self-monitoring their level of performance. As with subjective sleepiness, the ability to accurately monitor performance under sleep-deprived conditions is an important issue for many workers in our society. Unfortunately, few studies have addressed this particular topic. 

One means of examining the effect of sleep deprivation on effort is to ask sleep-deprived individuals to estimate how much effort they put into a task that they just completed. Although several sleep deprivation studies have used this approach, the results remains unclear. Some studies have reported decreased performance but increased effort on cognitive tasks (45), while other studies have seen an increased effort associated with no change in performance (52,53). Yet another study examining effort on cognitive tasks found no change in... 

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Legg SJ, Haslam DR. Effect of sleep deprivation on self-selected workload. 

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