Do Nightowls Prefer Staying Up Late?

  • Thread starter KLscilevothma
  • Start date
In summary, Nocturnal people are able to work well during the night while Diurnal people only work well during the day.

Are you a nightowl ?

  • Yes, I am and I really enjoy staying up

    Votes: 14 63.6%
  • Yes, but I am forced to do so

    Votes: 2 9.1%
  • No, I prefer sleeping at night and don't want my biological clock to be disturbed

    Votes: 4 18.2%
  • No, but I would like to try

    Votes: 2 9.1%

  • Total voters
    22
  • #1
KLscilevothma
322
0
I guess quite a number of PF members are nightowls, see if I'm right.

A question for those who are nightowls, why do you like to stay up at night?
For those who aren't, why don't you like staying up at night?
 
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  • #2
later this summer i was planning on going nocturnal. as of now my sleep cycle is normal though.
 
  • #3
I have to get up at 5:30 every morning for work. But left to my 'druthers, I go nocturnal pretty quickly.
 
  • #4
Sometimes I get up at 5:30am, have breakfast and get on PF, and go to school at 7am.

Sometimes I sleep very early and get up very early, say getting up at 00:00 or 2am and do homework or revision.

I haven't had a stable time table for quite a long time. :wink:

I like staying up and enjoy the quietness. At about 4am, I can hear birds starting to sing outside, which indicates that I need to finish my work as soon as possible.

Last night, I slept at about 8pm, got up at 00:00. At 5am, I slept again and got up at 6am.
 
  • #6
My sleeping patterns are terrible; even non-existent. My work often has me shifting between west coast and east coast time zones, as well as early schedules, late schedules, and mostly no schedules. However, if left to my natural tendencies, I would stay up all night and sleep all day. I have always been this way. This "liability" actually helps me to perform in the wee hours of the night while those around me begin to wither and whine. In fact, I have done much my best work, both academically and professionally, at 3:00 AM.
 
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  • #7
I work 2nd shift, but so I don't get of work until night. However, I consider myself an all around the clocker. Sometimes I get home, and stay up until 5 am. Sometimes I go strait to bed, and get up around 7 am. Depends on my plans which change constantly.

So I cannot vote.
 
  • #8
Well, I am a Nightowl, but I'm not forced and I don't choose it. It just happens that way. I still voted the first choice, since I do enjoy my time awake at night.
 
  • #9
I don't enjoy staying up, I just don't get tired[zz)]

I got a job with the state for the summer though, and that works me about 12 and a half each day...so I'm going to bed around 10ish or so every night!
 
  • #10
I generally work graveyard (6pm-6am) but currently am working the day side. (6am-6pm) I HATE THAT ALARM CLOCK!
 
  • #11
I prefer to sleep regulare midnight to 8AM or 9AM hours but from time to time (about 2-3 times a week) I may stay up until 1-3AM. Not necessarily by choice, I'm simply awake and can't fall asleep and so I get up and find something to do until my body's ready to pass out.

Once every 6 or so months I might even stay up all night go to work and stay up until midnight before I hit the sack. Usually I hate it when that happens, but I just can't seem to fall asleep until 12 midnigth or later sometimes. It must be psychological.
 
  • #12
Nightowl?

Nocturnal?

Biological clock?

Time enough for sleep in the grave.

I guess this makes me Diurnal? :P

No rest for the weary...
 
  • #13
i have no sense of a circadian cycle what so ever. i go to sleep when i collapse. and wake up when i can be bothered.
 
  • #14
Time enough for sleep in the grave

I once had a math professor who put the class on notice on day one. She introduced herself, took roll, and then she said handed out a class schedule and said, "you can sleep when you die, but for now you're mine"
 
  • #15
Originally posted by Ivan Seeking
I once had a math professor who put the class on notice on day one. She introduced herself, took roll, and then she said handed out a class schedule and said, "you can sleep when you die, but for now you're mine"

kinda scarry for a math professor...

I can't fall asleep until 1:00- 2:00 am. This is pretty nasty since I go to work at 8:am.
But I catch up in week-end...
 
  • #16
Orginally posted by Entropia i go to sleep when i collapse. and wake up when i can be bothered.
Yeah, this is also my sleeping philosophy. Sometimes I feel I'm wasting my time when I sleep too much. Besides, I can't sleep too long, say 11 hours, otherwise I'll have headache.

I think there are mainly 2 kinds of people, one of them like sleeping at night and work well before mid-night. The other one can only do well after mid-night and they like staying up. I belong to the second group and I find it hard to concentrate well before mid-night. It's kinda strange coz we humans need to rest in complete darkness for the sake of our health. Perhaps our habit has changed after the invention of light.

Sometimes I sleep at my desk to avoid oversleeping. Sometimes alarm clocks/devices at my room ring more than 20 times a night so as to wake me up to do my work. It sounds crazy! I scartter my alarm clocks(I only have three, including my mobile phone) everywhere in my room so I need to get out of bed and search where the sounds come from before I can switch them off. It sounds like an effective way but it doesn't work now.
 
  • #17
I can't sleep too long, say 11 hours, otherwise I'll have headache.

I wish I could get 11 hours of sleep. My biological clock, however, tends to get me up after 8 or 9 hours.

I scartter my alarm clocks(I only have three, including my mobile phone) everywhere in my room so I need to get out of bed and search where the sounds come from before I can switch them off.

This never worked for me. The alarm goes off and I just go on sleeping. Sometimes the alarm goes off and I never even heard it -- maybe it was a siren in my dreams. Come to think of it, there was a time a fire engine came to our neighborhood with sirens blaring in the middle of the night. According to everyone at home, they all got up, but I just kept on sleeping.
 
  • #18
to me, and most ordinary Chinese people, go to bed after 0:00 is incredible. It means you can't keep healthy and energic in the day time.
How do you all night owl keep your energy in the day time?
 
  • #19
Originally posted by chaoszen
to me, and most ordinary Chinese people, go to bed after 0:00 is incredible. It means you can't keep healthy and energic in the day time.
How do you all night owl keep your energy in the day time?
Hi Chaoszen and welcome to PF.
Well, if you always have loads of work to do and you feel like you never have time to finish them, as time goes by, you will end up to be a nightowl.

Well, sometimes I do feel extremely exhausted and sleep in class sometimes(teachers give us breaks to rest sometimes). To restore energy, a good sleep is essential. :smile: As you can see my final exam is around a corner, how can I sleep early if you still have piles of notes to study, tons of homework to be finished and stresses that need to be faced?

As I've said in my second last post, I think there are mainly 2 kinds of people. One of them like staying up and can do things better at night, the other type is just the opposite.

I think you are on vacation now as school term has finished, why not try to stay up and experience how it feels :wink:
 
  • #20
well,stress.
I thought american student didn't have much home work to do and can enjoy themselvs in the various social activity.
but what about Chinese students' stress, maybe more than this.
mountains of practice and homework.
 
  • #21
Originally posted by chaoszen
well,stress.
I thought american student didn't have much home work to do and can enjoy themselvs in the various social activity.
but what about Chinese students' stress, maybe more than this.
mountains of practice and homework.

This is generally considered true for high school students. Also, some college degrees are not so difficult to earn. However, science majors in the US work as hard or harder than most other students. For example, many schools in Germany provide classroom help with homework assignments. Boy that sure would have made life much easier for me as a student. For me, in order to complete homework assignments or to prepare for tests, it was common to go for days and days on very little sleep [I was a physics major]; this was common for all of my friends also. Of course, not all students work so hard; some because they are brilliant, and others because they are too lazy. But on the average, students in US colleges encounter very heavy academic demands throughout their college careers and well into their professional lives.
 
  • #22
I suffer from extreme depression-related insomnia...
 
  • #23
Originally posted by chaoszen
well,stress.
I thought american student didn't have much home work to do and can enjoy themselvs in the various social activity.
but what about Chinese students' stress, maybe more than this.
mountains of practice and homework.
So which countries do you think students in which have the heaviest study load? China, Hong Kong SAR, or Singapore? I don't know what it is like in China but I do know students in Hong KOng and Singapore suffer a lot in terms of stress and study load. I am not in USA, some of my friends are studying in the US and they told me study load there is not very heavy in high school. UK as well, study load isn't that high. (I have friends studying in USA and UK, that's their opinions about studying in these 2 countries.)

Originally posted by Ivan SeekingHowever, science majors in the US work as hard or harder than most other students
IMO, universities are places for professional studies, no matter how brilliant a person is, he/she must work hard so as to develope his/her potential to the full. I think university courses are more or less the same in every country. I know a person in USA who has studied a course on astrophyiscs and astronomy, in which the content is more or less the same as the one I studied in September.

But on the average, students in US colleges encounter very heavy academic demands throughout their college careers and well into their professional lives.
I think USA is a great place for research and study. You guys have lots of chances to do whatever you like. :wink: I wish I was in USA, choose whatever subjects I like to study and go for it. I would be much happier if I was there. I would have a less stressful life in high school and probably have a brighter future.
 
  • #24
Sleep is for whimps.

I'm currently going back to school for my degree, taking three courses this past semester. I also work a full time and partime job, with an hour and fifteen minute commute (total of both ways) to the full time job. I am married and do the cooking and cleaning, (she also works full time and parttime and does the laundry and dishes).

I usually sleep from about 1:30 AM to about 6:30 AM. Weekends are no exception.
 
  • #25
Artman, how can you manage all these? I can't have only 5 hours sleep everyday, though I wish I could.

It usually takes me 45 minutes to go to school and 1 hour to go home. I have had lots of extra curricular activities since September and I hope I can have some rests after the final exam. Besides 3 A-level science subjects and 2 languages that I'm studying, I took a university course (3 credits) from Sept. to Dec and a training program on astronomy from Sept. to January. In Sept and October last year, I was a private tutor of 2 students and gave tutorial lessons to them 6-7 days a week and I quitted teaching one of them in November. I'm a committee member of Student Librarian Society and Mathematics Society in school, organized lots of functions and activities for members. Also I'm a school prefect...and a lot more. :wink:

I do hope I can have some rest after the exam, though I need to finish 2 BIG projects and lots of summer assignments. Extra lessons will be given by teachers in the middle of the exam and after exam. Summer holiday here will start from 23rd June, an extremely short one. I've applied for a university math course (2 credits) and an enginnering day camp in this summer holiday, see if I can get offers.

Now I only want to do ok in exam. I haven't started revising yet and I'm now really worried, exam syllabus includes everything I've learned from September. If I fail in any subject, I might get expelled from my school. Also I don't want my grades drop dramatically in this term. I'm keeping my fingers crossed !
 
  • #26
Artman, how can you manage all these? I can't have only 5 hours sleep everyday, though I wish I could.

You've got quite a list there yourself.

I don't have much choice. I cleared my schedule of meetings for various organizations, drama groups, church activities, that I normally would have had so that when I went back to school so I could have more time. I wasn't working the part time job when I first started back to school, that came up later, but the work is light and I can get some studying done sometimes.

I'm good at learning with minimal instruction, so I am taking online and correspondence courses. The due dates are flexible for the assignments, and you can pace yourself to meet your own working hours. They are a lot tougher than you might think. They are not for everyone, but they are ideal for students who have full time jobs and can't take the time to sit in a classroom. Also, I can get credit for life experience through the school I am using.

I've always been a nightowl and pushed the sleep boundary. I get my best work done at night.
 
  • #27
Orginally posted by myselfSummer holiday here will start from 23rd June
I mean 23rd July, not June.

I'm good at learning with minimal instruction, so I am taking online and correspondence courses. The due dates are flexible for the assignments, and you can pace yourself to meet your own working hours. They are a lot tougher than you might think. They are not for everyone, but they are ideal for students who have full time jobs and can't take the time to sit in a classroom. Also, I can get credit for life experience through the school I am using.
It sounds like Open University here, which offers degree studies for students who have full time jobs. The university course I took in September last year was an online one too, but we needed to go to the university to have mid-term tests and exam. If we could afford the time, we could go to the university to attend lectures on Saturday morning. Also we had an online chatting session each Thursday night in which we could chat to our prof. and asked questions if we had any.

I've always been a nightowl and pushed the sleep boundary. I get my best work done at night.
I like pushing the sleep boundry as well, but not the week before exam. I need to have long hours sleep after having little sleep few days in a row. Can you stay up when you are working or studying ?
 
  • #28
The university course I took in September last year was an online one too, but we needed to go to the university to have mid-term tests and exam.

I have to take a final exam for online courses and midterm and final for guided study courses. The exams have to be taken at approved locations such as colleges, universities, or libraries with a full time librarian. I just took my C programming final today, so I went to bed early last night, 12:30 :smile: (I pretty much live on coffee and sugar )
 
  • #29
After your final exam, I think you can get 6 hours sleep per night. :wink:

Well, last night, I stayed up from 1am till 5:15am to study, get on PF and type 7 minutes(I should have typed them immediately after each meeting, but I was too lazy to do so). I slept again at 5:15am and got up at 6am. I only spent 45 minutes on my bed. But I slept at my desk for about 3 hours before 1am. I think I'll do the same tonight, I am running out of time to study. There are 30 students in my class, 10 of them will be absent tomorrow, stay at home and study instead of going to school. From this, perhaps you may get a better understand of how desperate we are towards this final examination.

Sometimes when I feel tired but don't want to oversleep, I just sleep at my desk instead of going to bed. After years of practice, I can sleep more than 2 hours continuously at my desk.

Well, drinking too much coffee isn't good to our health. Don't tell me you drink at least 8 cups of coffee per day!
 
  • #30
Originally posted by KL Kam
After your final exam, I think you can get 6 hours sleep per night. :wink:...

Well, drinking too much coffee isn't good to our health. Don't tell me you drink at least 8 cups of coffee per day!

I don't get a Summer break this year, but I am only taking one course this next semester.

I usually have about 4 cups of coffee per day.
 
  • #31
i just don't need to sleep, i can spend all night watchinng late night films (no that kind), (well maybe that kind) (but only occasionally), or reading or on the computer. and all of a sudden bam its seven in the morning and I am going to work.

i just must have a real bad case of insomnia
 

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