Sleep Disorders

Sleep disorders

by Hassan Tariq

Assignment presented for the Course

INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHOLOGY

Taught by ALEXANDER STIRLING

In the winter semester, 2007

Cegep John Abbott College

"One third of North American adults report sleep problems and many children also experience sleep disturbances." (Wood et al. 124)There are many different types of sleep disorders; they vary from light to heavy. Sleep problems are increasing day by day but still most medical schools provide less then two hours' instruction on sleep and sleep disorders. (Wood et al. 124). Some of the sleep problems include sleepwalking, sleep terrors, narcolepsy and insomnia.

A TEENAGE girl in London leaves her house and climbs to the top of a 40-metre crane. An Australian woman goes off in the middle of the night to have sex with strangers. A Canadian man drives 22 kilometers to his in-laws' house, murders his mother-in-law and drives back home. Strange behavior, but stranger still when you consider that all these people were asleep at the time.

Stage N3 sleep; EEG highlighted by red box. Thirty...

Polysomnography (PSG) is a multi-parametric test u...

English: Stage 2 sleep. Sleep spindles highlighted...

(New Scientist, 2006)

You may have seen in cartoons that sleepwalkers walking with eyes closed and their arm extended forwards. Sleep walking is more then that. Sleepwalking is the acting out of complex behavior while sleeping. Usually sleepwalkers have their eyes open with a blank stare. Their coordination is mostly poor. Some times they can also talk but their speech is incomprehensible to listeners. In some strong cases people can do all sorts of things while sleeping; some of actions are driving, doing the laundry and even cooking. (New Scientist, 2006) If someone is a sleepwalker there is some chance that he or she develops a case of sleep-eating. Sleep-eating is basically a side effect of the prescription sleeping pill Ambien. New Scientist (2006) provide us with a good example of what sleep-eating is "One...