Lack of sleep can rob your brain of the skills required to successfully navigate life, and new research has added another impairment to the list.
In the study (described here), people deprived of sleep for a night had trouble identifying a facial expression as happy or sad. The authors speculate that this could affect everyday social interactions. Misreading a spouse or co-worker as happy when they are actually sad (or vice versa) could cause an inappropriate response, putting a strain on relationships.
And that's on top of the purely cognitive impairments that sleep deprivation can bring. We frequently discuss how sleep issues lead to brain issues, and will have a lot more to say as we analyze the results of The World’s Largest Sleep Study.
Let me know what you think in the comments. Your replies make me sad. No, wait ... happy. Sorry, I didn't get much sleep.