That's 20 minutes less than the average American adult gets, according to the National Sleep Foundation's 1999 Sleep in America poll. Sleep specialists say most adults need about 8 hours of sleep per night for optimal alertness.
Fatigue curbs alertness, impairs performance, and upsets mood.
These are worrisome consequences for police officers who often must respond fast yet are expected to make sound judgments. Police officers, particularly those on patrol, face many different types of emergencies. They often must drive, dividing their attention between traffic, sending and receiving messages, and watching for people who are breaking laws as well as those needing help. They may need to maintain alertness for long periods of inactivity or while they perform routine chores. In Tired Cops , Bryan Vila, a former police officer and chief, and associate professor of criminal justice at the University of Wyoming, documents the severity of fatigue in patrol officers.