'Night Owls' Taking Morning Classes Get Poor Marks
Studying till late in the night will only fetch poor grades and it is high time to tailor students' class schedules to their natural biological rhythms, stress researchers. Students whose circadian rhythms were out of sync with their class schedules -- say, night owls taking early morning courses -- received lower grades due to "social jet lag," a condition in which peak alertness times are at odds with work, school or other demands.
"We found that the majority of students were being jet-lagged by their class times, which correlated very strongly with decreased academic performance," said study co-lead author Benjamin Smarr from the University of California-Berkeley.
To reach this conclusion, the team tracked the personal daily online activity profiles of nearly 15,000 college students as they logged into campus servers.
After sorting the students into "night owls," "daytime finches" and "morning larks" -- based on their activities on days they were not in class -- researchers compared their class times to their academic outcomes.
In addition to learning deficits, social jet lag has been tied to obesity and excessive alcohol and tobacco use, said the study published in the journal Scientific Reports.
"Our research indicates that if a student can structure a consistent schedule in which class days resemble non-class days, they are more likely to achieve academic success," said study co-lead author Aaron Schirmer, an associate professor of biology at Northeastern Illinois University.
Previous studies have found that older people tend to be active earlier while young adults shift to a later sleep-wake cycle during puberty.
Overall, men stay up later than women, and circadian rhythms shift with the seasons based on natural light.
Finding these patterns reflected in students' login data spurred researchers to investigate whether digital records might also reflect the biological rhythms underlying people's behaviour.
The results suggest that "rather than admonish late students to go to bed earlier, in conflict with their biological rhythms, we should work to individualise education so that learning and classes are structured to take advantage of knowing what time of day a given student will be most capable of learning," Smarr said.
"Different people really do have biologically diverse timing, so there isn't a one-time-fits-all solution for education," he added.
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Ex-Army officer assaulted, robbed at gunpoint by woman he met through matrimonial website
Mathura(UP), Apr 5 (PTI): A retired Army colonel from Haryana has filed a police complaint here, alleging that he was held hostage, assaulted, looted and forced to participate in an "obscene video" at gunpoint with a woman he met through a matrimonial website, police said on Saturday.
The woman from Mathura, who was allegedly in on the plan to rob him, was working with other accomplices, the ex-armyman said in his complaint filed on Thursday.
According to Barsana Station House Officer (SHO) Raj Kamal Singh, Colonel Rajneesh Soni (retired), a resident of Gurugram, reported that he was contacted by a woman from Barsana on a matrimonial website in January. The woman allegedly agreed to marry him, and they began communicating.
The woman allegedly persuaded the colonel to visit Barsana on January 25, requesting that he visit the Radharani temple. When he arrived, she arranged for his stay at a guest house and took him on a tour of the area, including a visit to the temple, the complainant said.
After returning to the guest house, the woman and her accomplices allegedly told the colonel that her brother had been involved in an accident and they needed to leave immediately. They then led him to a waiting car.
"Once outside the town limits, the colonel alleges that he was attacked by the occupants of the car. They seized his phone, physically assaulted him, and forced him to contact relatives and friends to transfer money," the SHO said.
"He was then taken back to the guest house, where he was allegedly forced to participate in obscene videos and photographs at gunpoint. He was threatened that the videos would be made public if he reported the incident," the officer said.
The colonel has alleged that his purse, bag, gold chain, debit card and Rs. 12,000 in cash were stolen from the guest house.
After an unsuccessful attempt at locating the perpetrators himself, the colonel finally reported the incident to the Barsana police two days ago, he said.
"A case has been registered under relevant sections of the BNS and all facts are being investigated. Further action will be taken as per facts found in the investigation," the SHO said.
