So, I have been thinking about this because my wife has woken up in the middle of the night thinking I was falling off the side of the bed whereas my sleeping body knew perfectly where the edge of the bed was.
Also, sleeping kids sometimes roll over and fall off the edges whereas as we grow up, our bodies somehow come to learn this ability.
And, it works for us even if it’s an unknown bed for us (a hotel bed for example).
In: Biology
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I don’t think your brain is off when you sleep, rather your conscious mind is off.
So the real question here is how do you know where the edge of the bed is when you are awake? You can feel it. How do you feel it? That’s a complicated question about perception.
Even when you’re asleep, your brain isn’t completely switched off and some functions still remain active. Some of the things at play that stop you – even while unconscious – from falling off the bed every night:
Probably the most relatable in every day life is muscle memory. Like learning an instrument or the controls of a videogame, eventually your body understands on an automatic level where the edge of the bed is likely to be.
Your brain also has an awareness of where each of your body parts are in relation to one another. This isn’t infallible, but it’s how you’re able to touch your nose with your eyes closed or interlock your fingers behind your back without much difficulty.
Our bodies also sense pressure while we’re asleep – we still feel the bed beneath us, the covers around us, and so on. If we end up rolling too far, the pressure will change, our brains pick up on this change and send a signal for us to change position.
The reason kids may roll off the bed more than adults is because their brains are still learning and developing these skills. As they get older and more used to sleeping in beds they will get much better at staying in them. Eventually, we can get so used to sleeping in beds that even when sleeping in a completely new bed for the first time, like a hotel bed, our bodies know how to adapt very quickly.
So it’s a lot of cool attributes constantly working together behind the scenes in combination with our own human adaptability 🙂
We evolved to not fall out of elevated nests in trees. The edge of a bed is pretty similar.
Your brain has a sense that relates to your body and it’s location(s). A vector based “image” that is part of your subconscious mind. It works whether you’re awake or not.
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