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Sleep and learning

Published on August 31, 2026   13 min

A selection of talks on Management, Leadership & Organisation

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0:00
My name is Dr. Cynthia Nebel. I'm the Director of Learning Services at St. Louis University School of Medicine, and today we're talking about sleep and learning.
0:12
Take a minute and think how much sleep do you actually need, and maybe even how much sleep did you get last night? It turns out that we typically need more sleep than we think we need. In reality, most adults need 7-9 hours of sleep. You might be thinking, oh, gosh, but I'm one of these people that can get by just fine on 4-5 hours. It turns out that less than 3% of the population needs just six hours of sleep. So if you're only getting 4-5, you're probably not getting enough sleep. Most people need to aim for that seven hours and maybe a bit more than that in order to function optimally.
1:00
But does that one hour really matter that much? It turns out that it does. Short-duration sleep, so less than 7 hours, is associated with an increased incidence of coronary artery disease, hypertension, arrhythmias, diabetes, obesity, depression and anxiety, and a weakened immune system. Your body needs sleep. We can see all of these physical issues that come up when we don't get enough sleep. Again, here we're just talking about less than seven hours. Sleep is really important. But the focus of most of what I want to talk to you about today is about sleep and learning. Still, let's stay on this one-hour kick.

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