Why missing a night of sleep can damage your IQ

From Napoleon Bonaparte and Margaret Thatcher to Twitter founder and Square, Inc. CEO Jack Dorsey and Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer, many successful leaders have claimed they only need 4-5 hours of precious sleep a night. They seem wired differently and shame the rest of us for craving eight hours of shut eye every night.

But for the majority of us - including many top CEOs and world leaders - this is certainly not the case, according to Dr. Tara Swart, an international neuroscientist and CEO of The Unlimited Mind. Missing a night of sleep can have quite a "devastating" effect on our performance, Swart says.

"One to two percent of the population can survive on four hours of sleep a night," said Swart, "but 7-8 hours is optimal for most of us," she claims.

Could the secret to success in your professional lives be linked to how well you sleep?

"There's a very strong correlation between restfulness and leadership," according to Jessica Payne, associate professor and director of the Sleep Stress and Memory Lab at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana. "The majority of people need seven to nine hours of sleep and the majority of people don't get that much," cites Payne. It's as important as diet and exercise, she added.

Long term damage

While many of us skimp on sleep for years, thinking we can either make up for it at the weekend or another time, these long-term habits can add up to big trouble. The problems really strike after many years of doing this, said Payne. Memory problems, issues with decision-making, lack of creativity and regulating personal emotions are some of the first areas to be diminished by lack of sleep, according to Payne.