

Ask HN: Smart people sleep late? - clwen

Some researches suggest that people with higher IQ sleep late. e.g., &#60;http://bit.ly/OUp4m6&#62; (google the keywords and you get bunch more)<p>However, this doesn't make sense to me because I personally know some brilliant people are morning type: maybe wake up at 4am or even 3am.<p>HN people, do you sleep late? Do you feel you have a higher IQ?
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mooism2
Asking people to self-report their IQ will give you misleading results. I'd
expect people with embarrassingly low IQs (in comparison to those IQs that are
reported) to be less likely to comment.

I don't remember ever taking an IQ test... but my personal anecdatum is that I
feel more productive when I have a regular sleep cycle, but that can involve
waking up at 7am or 9am or earlier or later and what that depends on, beyond
the seasons, I don't know.

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redspark
I have taken a few of those online IQ tests and they show to be well above
average. I don't believe those tests to be accurate and more importantly I
don't believe IQ is an accurate measurement of anything meaningful.

That being said I am an odd mix of morning person, night person. I function
very well if I am out of bed by 6-6:30am, then I drop off about 11:00am. From
7pm-1am I again function at a high level. I typically only sleep about 4-5
hours per night and feel very groggy if I sleep more than that.

I agree with most of the other responses. I think your peak production period
depends on the season, type of work and lifestyle.

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zura
Not sure about IQ, but I remember when I had to prepare for some exam, in a
subject uninteresting to me, I was procrastinating a whole day and only
starting to study at 00:00 midnight till 3:00-4:00.

For me, it also depends on where I am. In the city - get up late, go to bed
late. In the village/farm house - get up 5:00-6:00 morning, go to bed earlier,
usually 21:00-22:00.

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tokenadult
I challenge the validity of the statements. There doesn't appear to be any
good-quality research on correlation of IQ and sleep habits.

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orangethirty
I'm dumb as a rock and I sleep late/wake up early. Only get to enjoy REM on
Sundays.

