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Back to Press Play with Madeleine Brand

Press Play with Madeleine Brand

Why sleeping alone may be keeping you up at night

You’ve heard the rules for being rested: Get 7 to 8 hours of sleep, limit caffeine, have a bedtime routine, turn off your devices. But many still struggle. The Centers for Disease Control says that more than 50 million American adults have a sleep disorder.

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By Madeleine Brand • May 8, 2017 • 1 min read

You’ve heard the rules for being rested: Get 7 to 8 hours of sleep, limit caffeine, have a bedtime routine, turn off your devices. But many still struggle. The Centers for Disease Control says that more than 50 million American adults have a sleep disorder. A new book about the history of sleep found that two centuries ago, things were completely different. Sleep was social, and people dozed in two 4-hour chunks rather than a straight 8-hour shot through the night.

Benjamin Reiss is author of the new book “Wild Nights: How Taming Sleep Created Our Restless World.” (Photo by Gretchen Connell)

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    Madeleine Brand

    Host, 'Press Play'

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    Sarah Sweeney

    Vice President of Talk Programming, KCRW

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    Michell Eloy

    Line Editor, Press Play

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    Amy Ta

    Digital News & Culture Editor

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    Benjamin Reiss

    Emory University; author, “Wild Nights: How Taming Sleep Created Our Restless World”

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