Why Hammocks Make Sleep Easier, Deeper

This is totally cool! How in the world does movement change brain activity while sleeping????

http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2011/06 ... c=fb&cc=fp
Why Hammocks Make Sleep Easier, Deeper
by Nancy Shute
June 20, 2011

Napping in a hammock is one of the more delightful tasks of summer, and Swiss researchers say they now know why. The gentle rocking motion makes people fall asleep faster, and they sleep deeper. Those changes in brain activity may inspire new ways to help insomniacs, the researchers say.

Neuroscientists at the University of Geneva rigged up a bed so it would sway gently from side to side every four seconds, considerably slower than the pendulum on a cuckoo clock. A dozen adult research subjects napped on the bed for 45 minutes while scalp electrodes recorded brain activity. During one nap the bed swayed; for another, it was stationary.

The scientists weren't too surprised to find that people fell asleep faster when the bed rocked. But they were surprised at the big difference that rocking made in brain activity.

...the researchers say that rocking while sleeping should be tested on people with strokes or other brain injuries. Rocking is "changing things in your brain," Schwartz says. The Swiss scientists are eager to try the rocking bed on night-time sleepers, to see if it might help with insomnia and other common sleep disorders.