hey there!  welcome my friends to the new episode of Curiosity! A series in which we will answer some of the questions that makes us all curious.  

Most of the people who wake up after a sleep walk are disoriented , terrified and embarrassed , but it is nothing to be worried or embarrassed about. It's only considered bad because , the person might get injured during sleep walking. Well, a recent study says sleep walking is fairly common , 1 in 3 people will sleep walk at some point without even knowing specially common among the children between age 4 to 8. But why do they sleep walk? Lets find out the answer.

What actually is Sleep Walking?

Sleep walking is a behavioral disorder originating during sleep and resulting in walking or performing complex behaviors while sleeping. The complex behaviors might be eating, waling , talking or driving a car. The persons eyes are commonly open. Sleep walking is  Also formally known as "Somnambulism". Mostly occurs in children of age 4-8 and might be related to mental disorder if it occurs in adults. Usually, after waking up, they don't remember anything.

What are the causes?

For centuries, Scientists have been trying to figure out , whats causes sleep walking. Well, it's not completely solved yet, but we do know much more about this phenomenon in the present times. 

First common reason of Sleep walking is it might me Genetic, Yup Sleep walking runs in the family. It appears that persons with certain inherited genes might develop sleep walking behavior.

Other reasons might include Sleep deprivation, bad schedule, stressed , drunk, and taking drugs.

But, What Actually in your body causes Sleep Walk?

The leading theory about the sleep walk  is related to our sleep cycle. There are 4 stages of sleep cycle, Stages 1,2 ,3,4 are considered as Non-rapid eye movement (N REM) sleep and Rapid Eye Movement (REM) sleep is associated with dreaming. Each sleep cycle lasts about 90 to 100 minutes ans repeats itself thou-out the night. A average person experiences 4 to 5 sleep cycles per night. 

Generally stage 3 is the deepest sleep period and most of the sleep walking tends to happen during this stage. 

In a Normal Sleep cycle, you brain still gives the physical commands to the body. But those commands are suppressed by a neurotransmitter called GABA.  GABA is a neurotransmitter that sends chemical messages through out the brain and regulates communication between brain cells. The role of GABA is to inhibit or minimize the activity of nerve cells also playing a major role in behavior, cognition and response to stress.

Fig: GABA (credits)

So , in most of the sleep walker ,  There is some glitch in this process or some people end up with less production of GABA during sleep cycles. One possible reason for this is an underdeveloped system , in other words the body simply hasn't matured enough to produce enough GABA , which explains why is it more common in children.

Is it OK to wake up a Sleep walker?

Its just a myth that it's dangerous to wake up a sleep walking person because that may cause a heart attack or shock and the person might die. Its only considered dangerous because waking a sleep walker might make him confuse and try to hit them self or the person waking them up. So, when ever you find a sleep walking person just gently put them back to bed or very gently wake them up.

here's a sleep walking video for you:

So, that's it for this episode guys, hope you enjoyed it. IF you did, then upvote and comment your thoughts down below. Thank you

Stay Curious.

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Last Five Episodes :

Curiosity | What is the possibility of being hit by an Asteroid?

Curiosity #36 | Can Freezing our body make us Immortal? 

Curiosity #35 | What Would happen If all the humans suddenly disappeared overnight? 

Curiosity #34 How Can We Survive on Mars? 

Curiosity #33 What makes Ebola so dangerous?