Donald Trump really lacks sleep, according to this study
Researchers hypothesize that this is arguably what is hurting his decision-making, popularity, and mood.
Donald Trump's lack of sleep would interfere with his exercise of power. This is the conclusion of an American study published on September 25 in the scientific journal Economics Letters.
Columbia University researchers Douglas Almond (principal) and Xinming Du (student) analyzed the president's tweets from January 24, 2017 to April 10, 2020. They counted the hours the U.S. president spent awake or in sleep. reverse, dozing.
So a typical day goes like this: the president starts tweeting around 6 a.m., then once every two to three hours, with 10 tweets on average. So far, nothing to worry about.
However, the frequency of his activity on Twitter between 11 p.m. and 2 a.m. has increased by 317% since 2017. In short, Donald Trump is a night owl.
Three evenings a week on Twitter until late
At the start of his presidency, Donald Trump only poured out on the social network one evening a week. But in April 2020, it went down to three evenings.
The average time he tweets is 12:06 am (six minutes past midnight). As a result, his sleep time is less than 6 hours per night, on average.
So what? We can sleep little and remain efficient, as Emmanuel Macron would have it believe, who prides himself on devoting his nights to “substantive issues”.
Less success in his tweets
Yes, but Donald Trump's tweets don't have the same effect on his audience depending on the night he spent. So if he tweets the day after one of his sleepless nights or so little, his followers interact significantly less. He gets 7,400 fewer likes per tweet, 1,300 fewer retweets and 1,400 fewer replies, or 6.5 to 8% less than the average.
As if his words, too obscure or calling for hatred, elicited fewer comments. We remember the Twitter platform forced to conceal a problematic tweet from Donald Trump in May, published at 1 a.m. and 53 minutes in the morning, which justified the shooting of police at looters.
Likewise, if his bedtime is too late, Trump presents himself the next day as more irascible. This results in more angry words.
He gives way to his opponent
Even worse, the researchers noticed that after each of those nights with less sleep, his opponent's chances of winning the presidential election increased 0.6%, according to the Betdata website.
“The pattern we are documenting, the researchers write, is consistent with the President's gradual sleep shortening during his first term and performance compromised by sleep deprivation.”
Would a short-sleeping president run his country badly? According to former Democratic President Bill Clinton, lack of sleep plays a role in the exercise of power. All the mistakes I have made in my life are because I was tired, ”he said in 2010.
Sleep guru Arianna Huffington and former founder of HuffPost made the same observation about Donald Trump. In 2017 already, she advised him via her site, to rest, to sleep more and better. This has been her mantra since suffering a nasty fatigue-related fall.
Decision-makers sleep almost as much as the population
Further, a British study published in 2015 analyzed the sleep of politicians and business leaders. We learn that the sleeping time of the great of this world is approaching that of the general population.
Decision-makers sleep an average of 6 hours and 36 minutes, which is 12 minutes less than the French average. Thus, Nicolas Sarkozy used to go to bed around 11 p.m. to wake up at 6:30 a.m.
Donald Trump-type insomniacs represent only 1 to 3% of the population, according to Dr. Jean-Pierre Giardonella, cited by La Croix, and are lacking sleep, since a restful night should be between 7 and 9 hours .
With the presidential election approaching, stress is probably keeping Donald Trump awake, but if he wants to see his popularity increase, he would be better off dropping his phone, to refine the quality of his sleep and put some order in his ideas. and his moods.
