This Is What Sleep Deprivation Does To You

While recent research shows that seven hours of sleep a night may be more optimal than eight, that’s no excuse to reduce the amount of shut eye by even more. One good reason to keep clocking the proper amount of sleep is to keep the effects of aging at bay. In a BuzzFeed video, four sleep-deprived people are shown the repercussions of their insufficient snoozing — and the results are scary.

While the video’s makeup experiment might be enough to scare most into sleeping an adequate amount each night, science corroborates the test as well. One study showed that poor sleepers had increased signs of accelerated skin aging and slower recovery from a variety of environmental stressors such as toxins and sun damage. Another study found that sleep-deprived people were perceived as having more hanging eyelids, redder eyes, more swollen eyes, and darker undereye circles. Lack of sleep was also connected with paler skin, more wrinkles, fine lines, and droopier corners of the mouth. Additionally, people looked sadder when sleep-deprived than after getting a normal sleep, and sadness was related to looking fatigued.

Turns out Sleeping Beauty had it right all along.