# Study: Sleeping position reveals personality
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [September 16, 2003, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951 "2003-09-16T15:13:57Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/1 "2003-09-16T15:13:57Z")
> [@](#):
>
> [http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/science/09/16/sleep.personality.reut/index.html](http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/science/09/16/sleep.personality.reut/index.html)
>
> Whether it’s curled up in the fetal position, flat on the stomach or stretched out across the bed, the way people sleep reveals their personality, a British sleep expert said on Tuesday.
>
> Crouched in the fetal position is the most popular sleep pattern and favored by 51 percent of women, according to the results of the study he conducted for a large hotel group. Fetal sleepers tend to be shy and sensitive while people who assume the soldier position, flat on their back with arms at their sides, are quiet and reserved.
>
> The freefall, flat on the tummy with the hands at the sides of the head, is the most unusual position. Only 6.5 percent of people prefer it and they are usually brash and gregarious.
Am I really “brash and gregarious”?
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### Author:  [@welby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/welby)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/2 "2003-09-16T15:20:38Z")
You and me both, **sailor**.
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### Author:  [@booklover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/booklover)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/3 "2003-09-16T15:21:44Z")
Interesting…I wonder what my sleeping position (on stomach with arms crossed in a “pillow”) means. Gregarious but defensive, perhaps?
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### Author:  [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/4 "2003-09-16T15:29:05Z")
On my stomach, with my arms underneath me along my legs. Wonder what that means! Or fetal…but only when I’m cold.
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### Author:  [@gallows\_fodder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gallows_fodder)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/5 "2003-09-16T15:31:33Z")
What if you do all three?
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### Author:  [@Isabelle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isabelle)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/6 "2003-09-16T15:35:45Z")
My sleep position isn’t on here. What does that mean?
I sleep partly on my stomach and partly on my side and with my arms under my pillow.
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### Author:  [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/7 "2003-09-16T16:52:33Z")
Yeah, do I have multiple personalities or something? I guess I’m mostly shy and sensitive (except that darn pillow between the knees is apparently in the way ever since the ankle hardware was installed), but when my neck has been bothering me I’m quiet and reserved. (How is that different from shy and sensitive, anyway?)
And then there are the moments of sheer diagonally sprawled abandon, but that’s generally because the cat has his own ideas about how and where I should be sleeping. Does that mean my cat has the ability to change my personality? Or that large-busted women are unlikely to be brash and gregarious, because it’s uncomfortable for anatomical reasons?
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### Author:  [@DeVena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DeVena)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/8 "2003-09-16T16:57:52Z")
I also sleep flat on my face - I’m glad to see I’m not alone!!
Heh. That sounds naughty. 😛
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### Author:  [@Tansu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tansu)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/9 "2003-09-16T17:00:25Z")
How about hanging from a tree?
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### Author:  [@lno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lno)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/10 "2003-09-16T17:14:11Z")
I sleep on my side, tipped about ten degrees more so my top leg falls forward, with my arms folded tightly across my chest, wrists bent awkwardly and tucked against my shoulders.
Here’s a [picture](http://www.winternet.com/~grzesiak/lno.jpg) of me from about five years ago. I don’t remember when I started sleeping like this, but it’s the only way I can fall asleep now.
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### Author:  [@ataraxy22](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ataraxy22)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/11 "2003-09-16T17:46:53Z")
I sleep hanging upside down, my feet clinging to a horizontal pole. All the blood rushing to my head makes me soooo drowsy!
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### Author:  [@shelsbells13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shelsbells13)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/12 "2003-09-16T17:56:44Z")
What if you fall asleep in the fetal position, but then alternate between rolling yourself into a comforter burrito and violently smacking and kicking your spouse until he falls off of the bed and then spread across the length and width of the bed so he can’t get back on… what does that make me? Spouse says evil…
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### Author:  [@Dogzilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dogzilla)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/13 "2003-09-16T18:07:08Z")
I sleep in the exact same position as my dogs do. Only I bend my back legs, while they sleep with their straight out. It’s so we can all three fit on the bed, in a “spooning” position at the same time.
I’m not sure that says anything more about my personality than, “I need to get out more.”
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### Author:  [@Bruce\_Daddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bruce_Daddy)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/14 "2003-09-16T18:24:44Z")
This sounds like bullshit. I thought people shifted ever so often to hundreds of positions during the night. The disarray of covers on my bed in the morning is anctedotal evidence of this.
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### Author:  [@amarinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amarinth)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/15 "2003-09-16T18:50:57Z")
I would have considered myself the extreme opposite of “brash and gregarious” even though I do sleep on my stomach - arms either by my sides or by my head.
but maybe they mean by British standards…\
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### Author:  [@Audrey\_Levins](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Audrey_Levins)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/16 "2003-09-16T19:25:27Z")
Only the British would conduct a study with results that include the words “brash and gregarious.” Seriously.
FTR, I’m in that elusive 6 percent as well, and while I may be gregarious, I’ve never considered myself brash.
**Bruce\_Daddy,** I’ve also wondered about that, since this isn’t the first study on “how people sleep” but most of us do shift frequently.
I always took it to mean “the position you go to sleep in,” not the position you maintain…since you know one and don’t know the other.
Me, I can’t go to sleep unless I’m on my stomach. I feel so brash!
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### Author:  [@dorkusmalorkusmafia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dorkusmalorkusmafia)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/17 "2003-09-16T19:47:20Z")
I’m with booklover here. I typically fall asleep on my stomach with my arms under my head like a pillow. I used to fall asleep on my back with my arms crossed across my chest (corpse style) but eventually grew out of that.
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### Author:  [@Lsura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lsura)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/18 "2003-09-16T20:23:34Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Isabelle \*
> \*\*I sleep partly on my stomach and partly on my side and with my arms under my pillow. \*\*
I suppose it means we’re ideal (or perhaps “practically perfect in every way”).
🙂
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### Author:  [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/19 "2003-09-16T20:29:14Z")
I resent being called “gregarious”.
::goes off to look up “gregarious” in the dictionary::
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### Author:  [@DaToad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DaToad)
#### Post date: [September 16, 2003, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-sleeping-position-reveals-personality/201951/20 "2003-09-16T21:38:02Z")
This place is full up with us gregarious folk ain’t it?
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