Sleep cycles

[bunsen_h]

I've heard that when people are put in an environment that's completely devoid of day/night cues, they tend to adopt a wake/sleep cycle of about 26 hours.  (On average; there's considerable individual variation, as with any human characteristic.)  So what happens if people are put in an evironment that matches their wake/sleep period?  Do they tend to be better-rested and able to accomplish more than otherwise?  Unfortunately, most people don't have the resources to flit one or two time zones a day.
 

Comments

[martianmooncrab.livejournal.com]

that shows our home planet was different.. grin.

I was a shiftworker, and you do start to think there are 26 or more hours in a day.

[bunsen-h.livejournal.com]

Earth's rotational period used to be 26 hours, before the fly-bys by Venus stopped and restarted the rotation for "Joshua’s long day". It's all in Velikovsky. Bless me, what do they teach them at these schools?

[martianmooncrab.livejournal.com]

actually I had it in my brain that some planet had a 26 hour day and just couldnt remember where I had read it.. but I have all of Velikovsky's books.. so it must have sufaced from there..

[bunsen-h.livejournal.com]

Barrayar, perhaps. Bujold's "nice" planets tend to have days a couple of hours longer than Earth's; her less-nice ones tend to have shorter days. There's some authorial bias.

[martianmooncrab.livejournal.com]

I just think that a 26 hour day is better, and not like the 36(?) hour days in MIB movies.

[beable]

24-hour propoganda, clearly