A recent study rating 300 male and female Mentian advertising executives according to the average number of hours they sleep per night showed an association between the amount of sleep the executives need and the success of their firms. Of the advertising

In this argument, author connects time spent at sleeping with the working efficiency of an employee. He took the reference of a study conducted at the 300 employees of Mentian advertising and asserted that the employees who need less than 6 hours, perform better. I believe that the evidence provided to justify this assertion lacks reasoning. Sleeping is definitely a physical as well as mental activity which depends on lot of factors and just using a survey conducted merely on 300 employees will not be enough to draw a generic conclusion.

First of all the study conducted is limited to Mentian advertising. As we all know that sleep helps to recover from mental as well as physical tiredness. It is evident that proper sleep or proper rest is dependent on the amount of exertion. So it is highly possible that an employee who performs more mechanical work, will require more sleep to perform better the next day. Since this study only takes in account Mentian advertising executives hence to draw a conclusion for all sorts of business will be too much.

Secondly, sleeping habit is dependent on many factors like age, body conditions etc. A 50 year old executive might need more time to sleep and recover from exhaustion as compared to 20 year old employee. A person suffering from a minor injury or infection might require more hours of sleep as compared to a perfectly fit person. The argument does not take in account any of such factors, hence generalizing it is not justifiable.

Last but not the least, the argument does not tell the period of time frame for which the 300 employees have been examined. It is quite possible that the employees have been examined only for a week when they had significant amount of work load. Hence the conclusion drawn based on their performance during that time frame cannot be used to generalize for normal circumstances.

Summing up all the points, we can conclude that the argument does not take in account all contributing factors which impact sleeping habits. It cannot use merely one professional example i.e. Mentian advertising to come up with a suggestion for all sorts of businesses. To come up with a conclusion, the study needs to be conducted more rigorously taking up example from variety of professions.