6 hours 25 minutes of sleep, not one more. Tribal peoples do not sleep more than members of industrial societies, quite the opposite.
Take a nap, get at least seven hours of sleep, don’t go to bed too late… In recent years, studies on the quality of sleep have multiplied. Some have even suggested that the modern way of life, metro-work-television-sleep, has considerably shortened our nights.
But did our ancestors really sleep more than seven to eight hours? A study published in Current Biology make a point of breaking down several received ideas. To support their point, the authors studied the rhythm of life of three tribes living according to ancestral rhythms.
3 hours up after sunset
They sleep little, don’t take a nap, some don’t even have a word to describe insomnia. The Hazda tribes, hunter-gatherers of Tanzania, the San, horticulturalists who live in the Kalahari desert (Namibia) and the Tsimane of Bolivia, who live at the foot of the Andes Cordillera, do not have electricity or electricity. ‘computer. And yet, they don’t sleep more than we do. On average, they stay up 3 hours and 20 minutes after sunset.
“It is totally normal for us to stay up for hours after sunset, and this is nothing new, although electric lights may have extended this natural tendency to wake up,” said Jerome Siegel, professor of psychiatry at the ‘University of California, Los Angeles.
No impact on health
On average, members of traditional tribes sleep 6.25 hours, with a slight variation depending on the season. They sleep little, but are still in good health, which seems to contradict the mass of studies conducted on sedentary industrialized populations: pre-industrial tribes suffer less from obesity, high blood pressure and atherosclerosis. On the other hand, they are more physically active. This is proof that sleep is not the only factor to be taken into account.
“I feel a lot more comfortable about my sleep patterns now that I’ve observed these trends,” jokes lead author Gandhi Yetish, who is also a student at the University of New Mexico. (United States. In the end, it would be more the modern way of life that would have reconnected us with that of our ancestors. Because the study confirms one thing: respecting a regular rhythm, sleeping in a space where the temperature is moderate, and exposing yourself mainly to morning light is beneficial.
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