Article in the NYT: nytimes.com/2011/04/17/magaz … ml?_r=1&hp
Evidently, we’re not as adept as we have thought in training ourselves to need less sleep.
Online fast blitz might be a less boring “laboratory” for this sort of study than the attention tests the article references. When, for whatever reasons, I haven’t slept well for a couple nights, my online blitz rating tanks. When I’m well-rested, it goes back up.
The article implies we often deceive ourselves about our ability to sustain concentration with less sleep. This doesn’t seem to jibe with my own experience - I can tell the old brain is limping along at 3/4 speed.