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Up to 30% of children suffer from sleep problems be it their inability to fall asleep or stay asleep. However, a good night’s sleep is vital for physical growth, emotional well-being and cognitive health in children, especially when they are going back to school this autumn season. According to the National Sleep Foundation, children ages 6 to 13 years require a minimum of 9 hours of sleep though it is likely that most children today do not meet this recommendation.
Napping is one of the reasons commonly incriminated when it comes to bad sleep in children. A scientific study led by Ward in 2007, which investigated the relationship between daytime naps and night time sleep patterns, indicated that daytime napping for children over the age of 2 could lead to a poorer sleep quality during the night, resulting in awakenings.
On the other hand, other studies demonstrated that napping in young children can have a positive impact on their memory. One of them, led amongst pre-school children, concluded that children who nap were able to remember more item locations in a visual-spatial memory game with accuracy than children who do not, outsmarting them by 10%.
In fact, mothers should be aware that every child’s sleeping requirements could be different. If napping is working wonders on your child, then don’t change anything. Otherwise, investigate if napping is really the issue at hand, and make changes in consequence.
Sources:
Lathrop. 2013. Sleep Research Study Finds Daytime Naps Enhance Learning in Preschool Children. UMassAmherst. Retrieved from: https://www.umass.edu/newsoffice/article/sleep-research-study-finds-daytime-naps
Ward et. Al (2007). Sleep and Napping Patterns in 3-to-5-year old Children Attending Full-Day Childcare Centers. J. Pediatr. Psychol. 2008 33: 666-672. Retrieved from: http://jpepsy.oxfordjournals.org/content/33/6/666.full
