Structure and Dynamics

Tradeoffs between time allocated to sleeping versus waking result from variations in local ecologies and should correlate to alterations in behavioral life history strategies.  It was predicted that firefighters who sleep less, with lower overall sleep quality, would exhibit greater motivation for risk-taking, an important component of fast life histories.  Firefighters completed evolutionarily relevant questionnaires on five domains of risk-taking propensity that were correlated to sleep quantity and quality variables.  Multiple linear regression analysis indicated that self-reported measures of sleep quantity, sleep latency, and psychological and physical sleep quality were occasionally and variably related to within-group competition, between-group competition, reproduction, environmental challenge, and mating and resource allocation for mate attraction risk domains in predicted directions.