A Good Night's Sleep

Psychological data and brain scans show all the ways sleep can improve our lives, our bodies and our relationships

- TEXT BY CLARA MOSKOWITZ

A NIGHT OF SOLID REST can feel like a panacea. The quantity and quality of our sleep influence our physical health, our moods, our cognition and our ability to function in almost every aspect of life. Good sleep seems to improve all these measures, and bad sleep takes a significant toll. Yet sleep can't be divided into such a simplistic binary—researchers are coming to understand that it's more complicated.