Midday Siesta

A little midday siesta seems to be just what you need---or more importantly what your brain needs.

As American's we tend to walk around for the most part sleep deprived. Just take a look around and you'll see plenty of people yawning or nodding off during the day. And now it looks like that same sleepiness might also be keeping us from being as smart as we could be.

Researchers organized two groups of college students into those taking a 90 minute nap at 2pm and another group staying awake all day long like most of us do. During the day, both before and after nap time, the students performed different learning tasks. Those who remained awake during the day ended up also being worse at learning. The nappers ended up doing much better on the tasks and even improved how much they learned during the day.

This improvement comes about because of how our brains work. We store fact type information---like numbers, names and addresses--in a part called the hippocampus. They only stay there for a while then get sent to more permanent storage in the prefrontal cortex. This study's scientist liken it to you email inbox. If it doesn't get cleared from time to time, you won't be able to add more information.And that's where the nap comes in. It allows the brain to do what it normally wants to do. That clears out areas so you can learn more later on.

So although your boss, or more importantly your spouse might not buy it just yet, a nap a day can help keep you sharp as a tack.