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Sleep Deprivation and Climbing

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 Thomaslynchuk 15 Apr 2013
Hi everyone looking for a lot of advice I am planning on finishing 2nd Outdoor Ed and I how a idea of doing my research topic on The effects of Sleep Deprivation and Fatigue on Climbing Safely but how can I measure the changes ? is it dangerous to ask people to not sleep them to climb on a wall ? I really need help
 lost1977 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:

trying to work out why you are going to research this, surely the effects on safety will be the same as with any other activity
 Neil Williams 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:

"is it dangerous to ask people to not sleep them to climb on a wall"

Climb, probably not if they're top roping, as the effect of a fall is not likely to be significant. Belay, yes. You might want to tail the rope. Lead, I don't think I'd ask someone to do that unless they were pseudoleading with a top rope, and that only really has value for practicing gear placements anyway.

Neil
 cuppatea 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:

Top Gear did a test where they compared tired driving with drunk driving. It involved afaicr driving laps at constant speed staying as close to the white line as possible.

Might be worth a google and may prompt some ideas.
 cuppatea 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:

Some illnesses* feature fatigue as a major symptom. If you're interested send me a PM.

*brain injuries strokes MS ME Parkinsons etc
 brices 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:

Braniacs did a test involving making someone really tired and another really wired on coffee to see which was worse? may be relivant if not then its still funny.

youtube.com/watch?v=GF2BINXds-o&
 martinph78 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne: I'm finding it hard to read your post as it doesn't make much sense but...


> is it dangerous to ask people to not sleep them to climb on a wall ?

Probably, but then isn't that the idea of your research, to find out if it is detrimental to safety? If so, if you can find willing volunteers it could be done safely with supervision, saftey ropes etc. You'll have to consider other factors though, such as driving to the wall in a sleep deprived state etc.

I'd recommend discussing the protocols with your course tutor before going much further as you will be responsible for the participants safety pre, during and post-testing.

I think that you could also look at simpler tasks such as knot tying, maths (force calculations etc), perceptions of risk, etc in a sleep deprived state. That could be done in a controlled manner (ie sat at a table) and give relevant results.



 martinph78 15 Apr 2013
In reply to lost1977:
> (In reply to Plan Airborne)
>
> trying to work out why you are going to research this, surely the effects on safety will be the same as with any other activity

I think that's the joys of research. Analyse other peoples work, demonstrate specific areas that haven't been covered, propose further research into that area, do said research.

I'm new to degree level study but I've already learned (after reading hundreds of journal articles) that's pretty much what it's all about

Going back to school was one of the easiest decisions I made :p

 Ropeboy 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:

Just try and find someone with a new born!
 Ramblin dave 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Martin1978:
> (In reply to Plan Airborne)

> I think that you could also look at simpler tasks such as knot tying, maths (force calculations etc), perceptions of risk, etc in a sleep deprived state. That could be done in a controlled manner (ie sat at a table) and give relevant results.

This sounds sensible. If anything, the main reason I'd be worried about climbing while sleep deprived is the increased likelihood that I'll forget to do up a screwgate, forget to double back my harness, do something stupid with a knot etc.

The difficulty is that those things are probably going to be fairly small percentages even for people who are sleep deprived. Maybe you could do one of those annoying climbing-wall-induction style "spot the deliberate mistake" tests, either with pictures or with actual setups, and see if it makes them less likely to fail to immediately notice a badly tied knot in a belay or something.
 StuDoig 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:

Rather than looking at how they perform physically, try to include co-ordination / mental tasks as I suspect that these will suffer a lot more notably. Asking people to perform physical challenges other than toproping probably isn't a great idea due to risk of injury, and toproping might not really make much difference other than the obvious (i.e. they climb worse when knackered). If it does have to include actually climbing, I'd pick a few set routes, get them to climb them when fresh. Then when knackered and film / note the differences (loss of technique, missed holds, poor body position etc)

Ask the participants to perform routine climbing tasks such as tieing in / tying particular knots, setting up a belay, sorting gear, assessing length of rope left in a coil, fitting crampons etc. Compare times when fresh to when they are sleep deprived? Maybe look at some mental test (i.e. you've got 159m left to climb, averaging 30m per pitch, each pitch taking 40mins - how long to the top) to see how being tired will affect judgement on whether to press on / retreat.

Cheers,

Stuart.
pasbury 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:

I remember once leading Raindrop on Black Crag in Borrowdale in a state of extreme fatigue - it was my own fault after a few nights of late working and even later ales!
I actually nearly fell asleep at one rest point and found the whole thing very strange and other-worldly - like I wasn't really there but observing myself from a distance of 10 feet or so.
I would be in no hurry to repeat the experience.
 martinph78 15 Apr 2013
In reply to pasbury: Sounds like how I started Needle Ridge. You know you're screwed when you can't remember how to tie a fig.8! Thankfully a cup of coffee and some sun on the second pitch sorted me out.
 nw 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:
Surely the big problem is how are you going to control your subjects. Are you just going to take their word on how much sleep they have had? Monitoring their sleep is simple enough but will require a lot of logistics. I suppose you could get your mates round and force them to stay up, then go climbing or do whatever. But if you have to stay up to ensure that they do then you are not going to be particularly safe or switched on yourself.
OP Thomaslynchuk 15 Apr 2013
In reply to ALL: Hi everyone, Sorry for the bad English in the post, thanks so much for the comments and answers I really do not know what I am going to do for it and I am starting to worry now. my first thoughts were

What effects does social media have on performance and risk in outdoor pursuits
or
"What risk and ability have on the performance while trying to achieve in a chosen sport?”

I can see more links to this idea and in some way I could always include the idea of media having some type of effect in the risk which could structure a dissertation for me. I would love to talk about kayaking as that is my favorite sport but maybe I am letting my mind run off a little to much as I am not the best kayaker and I probably know more about climbing set ups ect then running hard rivers, this is why I have give "...In a chosen sport" as I can express the different outcomes in a number of sports and somehow finish with a overall result.
Any tips?
Cheers for what you all have already done, I owe you all big time.
markus691 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:
The basic problem is that climbing is actually quite safe. Effects on safety will be in the margins and it's unlikely that you can recruit a large enough sample of volunteers (or observation time) to see significant changes in things that are crucial.
(FWIW, a German study from 2004 with lots of observations found no effect of gym "density" on safety. Even though noise reliably impairs performance in the laboratory and the field.)
Plus, there's the ethical problem that you can't watch your participants endangering themselves without intervening.

In other words, you need a proxy for safety.
Routine tasks are a good idea, but again, the basic probability of error is so low that you're unlikely to find anything which can be described as a safety issue. They'll be slower, but that'll be it.
Spotting errors planted by the experimenter again will require either some obscure stuff whose relevance is questionable or most likely show no difference (except search/deliberation time) again.
Another option would be using (simple) rescue scenarios such as those found in the Tyson & Loomis book. Either as an oral exam or a simulation. One advantage here is that for once time is self-evidently important (unlike tying in at the base of the crag) and by generating a stressful situation you're more likely to push people into the margins, where the differences are. And you're not testing well rehearsed (and hence stable under changing circumstances) behaviours, but require new, complex stuff.

The best option is probably a combination of all three. Construct two circuits and have people climb with someone else who has been carefully instructed by you. Stick to toprope or have a "silent" toprope backup belayer.

Two circuits because you want to do this within participants. i.e. test each person twice. Some starting with tired with variant A, other rested with variant A, others tired with variant B and the last group starting rested with variant B. That is, fully counterbalanced.
That way you can ignore sequential effects and still use each participant as his/her control. Which will increase statistical power. Of which you'll need every little bit you can get.
 Cheese Monkey 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne: I work alot of night shifts and frequently climb when I'm feeling tired, although probably not sleep deprived!
In reply to Plan Airborne:

Research on doctors showed that after 2 nightshifts their functionality drops by 50% and they are comparable to being drunk.
On another note, I once went climbing after a nightshift and no sleep. The wall instructor took pity on me after watching me fighting with the harness for about 15 minutes, walked up, patted me on the head and said, with tears in his eyes, "you've put it on upside down"...

I think that could answer your research question.
 Dan Arkle 15 Apr 2013
Many mountaineers will have made mistakes due to being tired.
The data could already be out there. If you could compare incident or near miss reports that happened on the 1st day, 2nd day, 3rd day etc of multi-day trips you could get the answers you are looking for.

You might have to factor out weather related incidents.
 Sharp 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne: I think the most interesting effects of sleep dep (on climbing) are going to be surrounding decision making and the consequences of loss of attention. The former isn't really applicable in an indoor setting and the latter would be difficult to measure.

Why not take a few people out doing some orienteering problems in the cold and rain and then do a similar scenario again when they've had no sleep for a couple of days. Tiredness makes you miss hazards and rush when you're out climbing, that's where the safety concerns are most prevalent, not at the climbing wall.
 Neil Williams 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Sharp:

Tiredness could easily make you forget to screw in a screwgate, to back-clip, to Z-clip, to forget to double back your harness, to forget the stopper knot on a bowline or to lose control of the rope while belaying. All of these will cause nasty accidents indoor or out.

Neil
needvert 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:

Would be very interesting to include the effects of stimulants (including the prescription variety).


1. If the hypothesis that tired climbing is more dangerous, and is true, surely you are placing people in a more dangerous situation as a result.

2. Sleep deprivation takes a lot of time, its not a "fill out questionaire" type study, you may be able to find 1 or 2 bias test subjects. Yourself for example. You won't be able to draw many general conclusions from it obviously.

3. Search in online journals? This is a topic that's of interest to many fields.
In reply to Dan Arkle: This could be an interesting point, compare effects of physical tiredness and sleep deprivation (not necessarily co-existent). Get 2 groups out (e.g. DoE kind of groups) for a couple of days to work on the same problem at the same time (to exclude differences due to conditions and difficulty), one has a strict curfew every night, one sleeps say 2-3 hours a night just to keep them going, and compare how they do, what difficulties they encounter during the tasks and what mistakes are made. Simple things, really, such as navigation exercises and technical things combined with plenty of moving around to tire them out. Not sure how this would get past ethical approvals though.
 cuppatea 15 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:

Got your email, will reply when rested (and not using phone!)

A few quick ideas
Google search sleep rest performance etc, lots of news stories re rested athletes performing better.
A search of Google Scholar may throw up some previous research.
Chess Boxing (or whatever it's called) might be worth a look, I imagine the chess performance decreases with aerobic tiredness.
Finding a way of measuring cognitive ability that doesn't risk falling death should be a priority.
Any clubs nearby who maybe would help you? Sponsored 24 hour topropeathon to raise money for charidee perhaps? Maybe have a control group who are allowed rest doing the belaying.
Ghd brain uses a large amount of the body's oxygen and blood sugar (like 20% or something) so you can speed up fatigue in your lab rats by making them use their brains : faster than normal sleep deprivation as a torture technique.

Good luck! I'm hoping the deadline's 2014 and not next month.
 WILLS 16 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne: I work four on four off 12 hour shifts. My first day off after nights I can climb but not lead. My brain gets confused. Rigging a belay becomes a thirty minute affair. I have to really concentrate on stuff and triple check everything I do. So it just becomes a chore to climb on those days.
 Sharp 16 Apr 2013
In reply to Neil Williams: If you'd read my post you'd have seen I said those kinds of mistakes are "the consequences of loss of attention", if you're lucky enough to get a 50 person sample and half of them are tired then the chances of a mistake like that happening are still quite small, even if you spot it.

So you may end up with a research paper with the only conclusion that out of 50 people one person momentarily forgot to do up their screw gate, which isn't going to be groundbreaking research is it. Hence why I suggested trying to measure loss of decision making ability as this will give you more usable data.
abseil 16 Apr 2013
In reply to cuppatea:
>Top Gear did a test where they compared tired driving with drunk driving...

I remember reading [where?] that the UK police believe that a significant number of serious motorway crashes, particularly at night, are caused by drivers falling asleep (I never forget that probable fact myself/ don't want to be a statistic).
 Jamie B 16 Apr 2013
In reply to Neil Williams:

> Climb, probably not if they're top roping, as the effect of a fall is not likely to be significant. Belay, yes. You might want to tail the rope. Lead, I don't think I'd ask someone to do that unless they were pseudoleading with a top rope, and that only really has value for practicing gear placements anyway.

You've not done much Alpine climbing, have you?
 Neil Adams 16 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne: Plenty of experience out there from big alpine routes, e.g. http://www.marktwight.com/discourse.php?id=4
 Neil Williams 16 Apr 2013
In reply to Jamie B:

Nope. Must admit that (while I do understand why people do do it) the idea of the cold and discomfort doesn't overly appeal to me, I hate being cold, and can't imagine much worse than a mountain bivi in winter conditions. And I'm not a massive fan of the "leader doesn't fall" approach necessary for winter stuff. Call me a punter I suppose

But back to my point - it's not easy to conduct a controlled experiment in those conditions, is it?

Neil
 Jamie B 16 Apr 2013
In reply to Neil Williams:

Indeed. But it amuses me that we are debating the wisdom of going to a climbing wall while a bit tired when people take on massive technical and gnarly undertakings in 70-hour continuous pushes!
 Neil Williams 16 Apr 2013
In reply to abseil:

3-4am is meant to be the worst time. I spent a couple of years regularly driving to the airport at those sort of times, and it wasn't much fun. It was, however, preferable to using taxis, where they usually (despite it officially not being allowed by the company I tended to use) did it as the last job of the day having done the evening and so they were invariably knackered and driving was at best erratic.

I expect if it was feasible to measure tiredness in the same way as you can alcohol consumption, there would be a law along similar lines.

Neil
 Neil Williams 16 Apr 2013
In reply to Jamie B:

Fair enough. When you're doing something deliberately for research, though, rather than because a group of people decided to do some serious mountaineering off their own backs, there is the question of the ethics of putting them at risk in that way.

Not an issue if you can find some people to study who are doing the mountaineering anyway, of course.

Neil
ice.solo 16 Apr 2013
In reply to Plan Airborne:

i like the idea and would be interested in results. yes, its dangerous, but could be mitigated. worthwhile for the results id say.
if you are into it, thers many military studies into sleep dep.

otherwise find any climber with a newborn baby.

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