经典英语演讲稿(15篇)
演讲稿是一种实用性比较强的文稿，是为演讲准备的书面材料。在发展不断提速的社会中，接触并使用演讲稿的人越来越多，还是对演讲稿一筹莫展吗？下面是小编收集整理的经典英语演讲稿，供大家参考借鉴，希望可以帮助到有需要的朋友。
经典英语演讲稿1
Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, I’m very glad to make a speech here. Today my topic is “I love you, China.”
Since the day I was born, I began to have a proud name—Chinese. Since the day I began to talk, the most beautiful sentence I’ve ever learnt has been “I love you, China!”
I love you, China, and I’m so proud of being a Chinese. I’m proud that I’ve got the beautiful yellow skin, black eyes and black hair. I’m also proud that I speak the most beautiful language in the world—Chinese.
I love you, China, for I can feel the deep love you give me every day, every minute. Last year, I got an opportunity to visit the United States of America. During my staying there, my father’s boss once invited my family to dinner. While at , he looked at me and asked: “Little boy, how long have you been in America?” “About a month,” I answered, “How lucky you are!” he said, “If you were living in China, how could you learn such perfect English?” I smiled and told him proudly that all the students in China are able to learn English at school. I saw his surprised eyes and said to myself
“I’m proud of you, China ”
经典英语演讲稿2
Just read a report, a 19-year-old girl how clever, because of the exam hadno confidence a bit, although the test scores more than 7 points, colleges anduniversities to admit a line in the result under the single day take pills onhimself. This may be stressful. What a pity it is! She is not mature enough toknow the consequences of such a test. She does not know the consequences of herparents' love for her, or the influence of her parents' loss.
Adversity makes a man. Can suffer, can exercise a person. Hunger and thirstfor water, the value of a bowl of rice; Poverty and hardship, cold faces,hardships and setbacks can shape your character. On the way of learning, I feelthis way, when you feel learning is inferior to others, you will loseconfidence, or even give chance to others, when we want to know, opportunity isnot literally let to let go, is their fighting for. The hardship of life andstudy is such a torment, "the earth" always makes fun of it. We take the hardexperience and the growing season, record it! At the same time, it is possibleto find out the reasons for the hardship. Maybe there is no self-confidence, butthe people who lose their self-confidence can come back again. Yes, yes, likethe 19-year-old girl, she could have finished her studies, but she lost herself-confidence.
Let us remember the bitter lesson! I hope everyone has eving in yourself is the end of success.
经典英语演讲稿3
Dear:
Everyone in the growth process, will encounter this or that difficulties and setbacks. I think, how to deal with these difficulties and setbacks is essential. Faced with these difficulties, we should look at what it is what kind of action to overcome it and defeat it.
In the face of difficulties, there are two situations: one is a strong determination, indomitable spirit and courage to face and overcome it; the other is scared in face of difficulties, and the courage to face and overcome it. I have also encountered some difficulties and frustration.
Primary school graduation, my mother put me to the Han school. At the time, do not know what my mother would like, the day before school in the Pro and suddenly I transfer the. I'm even a little psychological preparation are not, unwittingly to a new, unfamiliar classes. Because I was Korean, not speak Chinese, the idea is not clear, word is always topsy-turvy, and people can not understand. I am very distressed. Would not speak, do not understand class and the results will slowly decline, relationships are a success. I am very sad, very blame my mother, why would I transfer it? So, I told my mother cry to: "Mom, I Can return to the school towards the family? In the Han school, I really can not stand." Mom shook her head, and I cried and cried, begged my mother for the answer. But it is futile. Mom is a serious [de] said to me: "Now that has already begun, to study hard. Only because of difficulties encountered little unfinished, I can not do!" After listening to my mother, I have nothing to say.
Then gradually I adapted to the learning environment in the Han school, the teachers care and the help of students, I bravely overcome difficulties and achieved certain results.
In the face of difficulties, my brave face it and overcome it. After elimination of the joy of the difficulties that I very happy.
Thank you!
经典英语演讲稿4
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen:
i’d like to start with a group of pictures.
"modern and advanced"? this society forgets, and ignores the other two thirds of human beings. it's far from the ideal! we call ideal as a utopian, a place where reality does not e_ist. a few people still look forward to the ideals. we make fun of them, considering they are naive. will we still be content to live in such a society, if misfortune drops to us? no! of cause not!
when we feel the warmth of the sun, these people, endure great sorrows and pains. can we imagine that? they are our brother and sisters!
facing them, will we still complain about our own misfortune?
facing them, will we still have the mood shouting for our own freedom? facing them, will we still want to have more and more unnecessary stuff?
they are unable to meet their needs, even the basic needs of survival! everyone, as a member of humanity, shouldn't feel ashamed? our lu_ury deprived their lives, our indifference violated our soul, and our barbarity destroyed human civilization!
what's the ideal society? it's a society no one worries about their living, a society no one is refused from education, a society everyone can pursue his/her own happiness! the ideal society is filled with love, joy and kindness. in that society, we can touch the other's hearts, we can share our dreams and most important, we can just be the true men!
let's break the ethnic divide, bridge the gap between rich and poor, hand in hand, to build a great wall, protecting us from evil; to construct a steady bridge, connecting reality to the ideal society! let's pursue for that, that's the only way to the bright future! they are watching us! thank you!
smoking is a greater cause of death and disability than any single disease, says the world health organisation.
according to their figures, it is responsible for appro_imately five million deaths worldwide every year.
tobacco smoking is a known or probable cause of appro_imately 25 diseases, and even the who says that its impact on world health is not fully assessed.
heart attack and stroke
uk studies show that smokers in their 30s and 40s are five times more likely to have a heart attack than non-smokers.
经典英语演讲稿5
my name is Sam , for those of you in the assembly that don’t know me, i am in year ………. ( may also say if they are representing the src or other group in the school etc).
i am not sure how many of you realise that today marks a very important worldwide celebration for children. today is universal children’s day. so what, you may say, what does this mean to me, and why should i even bother to listen?
well the answer is very simple, as students in china we live a life of privilege and relative safety compared to children and young people in many other parts of the world. we are very lucky. but this shouldn’t mean that we don’t care about other children and communities around the world less fortunate than ourselves.
i think some classes have been learning about how students just like us in other parts of the world have to struggle to survive. some children cant afford the things we take for granted like food, clothing, safe water and sanitation and having the opportunity to go to school.
today is a day set aside to promote worldwide unity between children and to increase the awareness by all people of the plight of vulnerable children in some parts of the world.
in nsw, we are calling our contribution to universal children's day, unicef day for change. as part of this day, our school is doing..(brief description of activity).
on behalf of the students and staff who have put time into planning this activity, i would like to thank you in advance for your support.
thank you
经典英语演讲稿6
I’d like to ask you to point out your favorite country if here is a map. Maybe you will choose the United States for the freedom; maybe you will choose French for the romantic. I’d like to say that these are nice countries for traveling. But there is one country in the bottom of my heart, and I will be proud of her forever, that’s China一一my motherland!
Our great motherland is one of the largest countries in the world. It has a population of over thirteen hundred million. Beijing is its capital.
It’s needless to say that China has a long China is a strong and developing country. Facts have proved that China is a powerful, invincible. If anyone asked, we will proudly say that I am Chinese.I am proud of you一一China.
I am a primary school student now; I know that all of us are the future of our nation. So, what we need to do is to study hard step by step, listen carefully in the class and do homework everyday so that we can dedicate ourselves to our nation when we grown up! That’s my speech! Thank you for listening.
经典英语演讲稿7
Dear every leader, dear teacher class:
Everybody is good!
In the life of the runway, a person's attitude is everything.
It is a national 1000 meters long, there are three players are on the runway, they are a, b, c.
Armor is the first name, is also a temporary leader, b is temporary second, third c is temporary. How will their final grades? This is attitude to determine their performance. Wear sports wear armour ran in front, he proudly thought: I also ran so fast that run slowly, anyway, there is two "turtle" in the back! Hence, a slowed his steps, large running; Running in second place b, b looked at the a, eyes envy eyes, he panting, he thought: anyway I also couldn't catch up with, might as well give up. Or don't run away, this also let the breath in our province. Said, and then a big rock for him to sitting on the sidewalk to rest. And the c is run in the final, but he has seen his behind, swing arm force, speed up the pace, sweating, as he ran, and encourage yourself: run fast, I still behind! "Life can have a few back to beat, not at this time when cardiac cardiac?" Good attitude, everything is successful, I had to run! To run the last peak and c faster, like an arrow, and finally get the long-distance running champion. At that time, all the audience paused, suddenly, all the audience of broke into thunderous applause.
You may ask, not the beginning, is ahead? What is now the most backward c take title? This is their attitude, armour is far ahead at the beginning, but he was too proud; And second, he could have success, but he was desperate; But know c is insufficient, and to find a way to make up for, in the end, he succeeded through their own efforts.
Life, long long, but attitude is everything. If a person's good attitude, everything can be made, but a person's attitude is not good, but all things are achieved.
It is an international long distance race, and it is a life long, is also an attitude of the test. Please remember: attitude is everything.
My speech is over, thank you!
经典英语演讲稿8
Independence Day 20xx Speech
Good morning India!
Today on 15th August 20xx India is celebrating its 67th Independence Day, and we Indians are proud to say we have owned our freedom 67 years old back. As we gather here today I take the opportunity to congratulate every student and teacher of this School/college a Happy Independence Day! I also take the opportunity of welcoming you our chief guest for today!
We have assembled here to celebrate our 67th Independence Day. As a citizen of India, I am so proud to talk to you about my mother India. On the night of August 14, 1947, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru rose to make a maiden speech in New Delhi, “When the world sleeps, India will wake to life and freedom.” Yes, India became free from the bondage of British rule. Now, India is the largest democratic country in the world. The country’s strength is to find, “Unity in diversity”. But, there are stray incidents that test her secularism but the people of India are ready to sacrifice anything for the cause of unity. Today we remember the great leaders who gave their lives for the nation’s freedom and prosperity. Dr. dkar gave the longest written constitution to us. Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru worked for an industrialized India. Gandhi Ji taught us Ahimsa and Non-violence. Subash Chandra Bose inducted courage in us. Swami Vivekanand gave us spiritual power. Yes, with these contributions; India will be the super power in the coming years. Our former President Abdul Kalam called the children of India to dream to build a strong Nation with aim and perseverance. Indeed! This is not a word of a single man. It is word of one billionsouls.
Jai Hind!
经典英语演讲稿9
that was pretty powerful. we are in the white house. smallbusiness owners, you heard from a large former business owner and tremendous entrepreneur, and we're sitting withadministrator mcmahon, who has an incredible entrepreneurial history. but it is very powering. really, this administration day in day out is steadfast in its commitment to jobs and job are feeling that and driving that. we are looking to unleashyou. you can bring your full potential, create more jobs. 60 million jobs in this country are a direct result of small businessentrepreneurs sell it is tremendously impactful on the ecosystem of job creation. we are doing everything we can and look forward to your input on how we can do even more. through comprehensive tax reform to enable you to have more money toreinvest in the growth of your businesses. there are 800 regulations put on the books by the previous administration that really many of which stifle your ability to grow and continue to create and produce. we are committed to addressing thosethings, creating increased access to capital, mentorship, as the fca does through its transformative and innovative ss to networks, to markets to trade with across state are committed to supporting the american worker and the american job creator. we are excited to be here to celebrate anagency doing just that. and in incredible director as shecommences her 65th year of the sba. not quite your 65th. [laughter] i will turn it over now to administrator mcmahon. she will tell us about initiatives and how they can support your businesses. then we will takes and questions from the audience.
经典英语演讲稿10
Learn How to Say No
We've all been taught that we should help people. It is the right thing to do and will make us popular with others. It may even win us favors in return. However, we must be realistic. We can't say yes to every request. If we did, we would fail or go crazy for sure. Sometimes we simply don't have the time to help. In this case, we must know how to say no politely.
When we need to say no, here is one method we can try. First, we should tell the truth. If we really can't do something, we should just say so. Second, we should remember to refuse requests politely. We must communicate clearly, but must also be sincere and sympathetic. A true friend will understand. Finally, we must not feel guilty about saying no. Sometimes refusing others is the right thing to do. It can save ourselves, and them, a lot of trouble. In short, we cannot please everyone all the time. Refusing favors is a part of life.
经典英语演讲稿11
the footsteps of the XX world expo is getting closer and closer to us, civilized and harmonious call is still ringing in my ears. shanghai, china obtained the right to host the world expo XX, expo XX shanghai china will be a world event, the development of shanghai's new round of golden opportunity, as it is an important embodiment of our national spirit.
world expo is a great influence and a long history of international activities, is the largest gathering of human beings. people from around the world gathered in one place display their roducts and skills, boast of their hometown and motherland. expo set the culmination of human civilization, which has a unique appeal, make you feel surging.
world expo is a platform, we are the masters. she put up alatfom rfor us to let the world know us; she built a bridge for us, so we better communicate with the world. this platform may let us display self wantonly. we are the masters here, we have to landlord, let guest experience enthusiasm and happiness.
everyone to contribute for the expo, we are no exception, as a living piece of fertile land in pudong's teachers, we are proud and pride. in the vision of a better tomorrow, we have to do for the world expo will own a wonderful ability, we have through our hands, warm heart and sincerity to practicalaction to achieve the commitment of shanghai to the world.
we should educate the many students: do not throw garbage anywhere, no spitting, no jaywalking ... ..., hello, thank you frequently mention, let the material on this city with the new york comparable to the spiritual civilization.
educate our students to exciting XX, willing tohanghai's future by copies of power, if only planted a small tree, participants in the shanghai world expo foreign guests feel: this is a forest city, pollution-free city, ancient and civilized city. better city, better life! until the time of the XX expo, then, we want to become a glorious volunteers, to changing our foreign friends in shanghai and china's long history, aout our education for the world expo will contribute their efforts.
we expect the majority of teachers will be great enthusiasm for the world expo into practical action to meet the world expo, the expo will be a total growth, and the city of development, the development of shanghai devote their efforts to advance hand in hand with shanghai.
经典英语演讲稿12
Everyone wants success. But what is success? Generally, people think success is a great deal of money, high position, academic achievement, and so on. However, most of these people never really define what success means to them. In my opinion, success is a feeling, which makes you happy and content.
Success is a feeling, that means success is not considered as big or small, high or low. It is just a good mood from your heart. Maybe passing a final test is a success for a student, learning to walk is a success for a little child, marrying a beautiful girl is a success for a lad, signing a contract is a success for a pany. Success varies from individual to group.
Success is a feeling, that means success is changing since your childhood. While you were a little child, you thought it was a success that your parents finally bought you lovely toys after you begged again and again. Success is the feeling you had when you were told that you won the contest. After graduation, you started working. You were successful when you finished a plicated task very well and you were praised. When married, maybe a happy marriage and a happy family meant success for you. When your child grew up, you hoped he or she attend a famous university or go abroad to study or work, at that time you considered that was your success. When you were old enough and couldn’t work at all, success was a feeling that your children and grandchildren came to see you from a long distance. Actually, success always acpanied you in your growth.
However, we have to admit that you can’t be successful all the time. We always meet many difficulties on the way to success. The more difficult it is, the much happier we are when we succeed.
To be successful, we should have a clear aim and then try our best to reach it. Wherever you go, whatever you are, your success belongs to yourself. It is a good feeling that you love it very much, and it really can make you laugh from the heart.
经典英语演讲稿13
Edward M.
Kennedy: ChappaquiddickMy fellow citizens: I have requested this opportunity to talk to the people of Massachusetts about the tragedy which happened last Friday evening.
This morning I entered a plea of guilty to the charge of leaving the scene of an accident.
Prior to my appearance in court it would have been improper for me to comment on these matters.
But tonight I am free to tell you what happened and to say what it means to me.
On the weekend of July 18, I was on Marthas Vineyard Island participating with my nephew, Joe Kennedy -- as for thirty years my family has participated -- in the annual Edgartown Sailing Regatta.
Only reasons of health prevented my wife from accompanying me.
On Chappaquiddick Island, off Marthas Vineyard, I attended, on Friday evening, July 18, a cook-out, I had encouraged and helped sponsor for devoted group of Kennedy campaign secretaries.
When I left the party, around 11:15 P.M., I was accompanied by one of these girls, Miss Mary Jo Kopechne.
Mary J was one of the most devoted members of the staff of Senator Robert Kennedy.
She worked for him for four years and was broken up over his death.
For this reason, and because she was such a gentle, kind, and idealistic person, all of us tried to help her feel that she still had a home with the Kennedy family.
Mary Jo KopechneThere is not truth, not truth whatever, to the widely circulated suspicions of immoral conduct that have been leveled at my behavior and hers regarding that evening.
There has never been a private relationship between us of any kind.
I know of nothing in Mary Jos conduct on that or nay other occasion -- the same is true of the other girls at that party -- that would lend any substance to such ugly speculation about their character.
Nor was I driving under the influence of liquor.
Little over one mile away, the car that I was driving on the unlit road went of a narrow bridge which had no guard rails and was built on a left angle to the road.
The car overturned in a deep pond and immediately filled with water.
I remember thinking as the cold water rushed in around my head that I was for certain drowning.
Then water entered my lungs and I actual felt the sensation of drowning.
But somehow I struggled to the surface alive.
I made immediate and repeated efforts to save Mary Jo be diving into strong and murky current, but succeeded only in increasing my state of utter exhaustion and alarm.
My conduct and conversations during the next several hours, to the extent that I can remember them, make no sense to me at all.
Although my doctors informed me that I suffered a cerebral concussion, as well as shock, I do not seek to escape responsibility for my actions by placing the blame either in the physical, emotional trauma brought on by the accident, or on anyone else.
I regard as indefensible the fact that I did not report the accident to the policy ead of looking directly for a telephone after lying exhausted in the grass for an undetermined time, I walked back to the cottage where the party was being held and requested the help of two friends, my cousin, Joseph Gargan and Phil Markham, and directed them to return immediately to the scene with me -- this was sometime after midnight -- in order to undertake a new effort to dive down and locate Miss Kopechne.
Their strenuous efforts, undertaken at some risk to their own lives also proved futile.
All kinds of scrambled thoughts -- all of them confused, some of them irrational, many of them which I cannot recall, and some of which I would not have seriously entertained under normal circumstances -- went through my mind during this period.
They were reflected in the various inexplicable, inconsistent, and inconclusive things I said and did, including such questions as whether the girl might still be alive somewhere out of that immediate area, whether some awful curse did actually hang over all the Kennedys, whether there was some justifiable reason for me to doubt what has happened and to delay my report, whether somehow the awful weight of this incredible incident might, in some way, pass from my shoulders.
I was overcome, Im frank to say, by a jumble of emotions, grief, fear, doubt, exhaustion, panic, confusion and shock.
Instructing Gargan and Markham not to alarm Mary Jos friends that night, I had them take me to the ferry crossing.
The ferry having shut down for the night, I suddenly jumped into the water and impulsively swam across, nearly drowning once again in the effort, and returned to my hotel about 2 A.M.
and collapsed in my room.
I remember going out at one point and saying something to the room the morning, with my mind somewhat more lucid, I made an effort to call a family legal advisor, Burke Marshall, from a public telephone on the Chappaquiddick side of the ferry and belatedly reported the accident to the Marthas Vineyard y, as I mentioned, I felt morally obligated to plead guilty to the charge of leaving the scene of an accident.
No words on my part can possibly express the terrible pain and suffering I feel over this tragic incident.
This last week has been an agonizing one for me and for the members of my family, and the grief we feel over the loss of a wonderful friend will remain with us the rest of our e events, the publicity, innuendo, and whispers which have surrounded them and my admission of guilt this morning raises the question in my mind of whether my standing among the people of my state has been so impaired that I should resign my seat in the United States Senate.
If at any time the citizens of Massachusetts should lack confidence in their Senators character or his ability, with or without justification, he could not in my opinion adequately perform his duty and should not continue in people of this State, the State which sent John Quincy Adams, and Daniel Webster, and Charles Sumner, and Henry Cabot Lodge, and John Kennedy to the United States Senate are entitled to representation in that body by men who inspire their utmost confidence.
For this reason, I would understand full well why some might think it right for me to resign.
For me this will be a difficult decision to has been seven years since my first election to the Senate.
You and I share many memories -- some of them have been glorious, some have been very sad.
The opportunity to work with you and serve Massachusetts has made my life so I ask you tonight, the people of Massachusetts, to think this through with me.
In facing this decision, I seek your advice and opinion.
In making it, I seek your prayers -- for this is a decision that I will have finally to make on my has been written a man does what he must in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles, and dangers, and pressures, and that is the basis of human morality.
Whatever may be the sacrifices he faces, if he follows his conscience -- the loss of his friends, his fortune, his contentment, even the esteem of his fellow man -- each man must decide for himself the course he will follow.
The stories of the past courage cannot supply courage itself.
For this, each man must look into his own soul.I pray that I can have the courage to make the right decision.
Whatever is decided and whatever the future holds for me, I hope that I shall have been able to put this most recent tragedy behind me and make some further contribution to our state and mankind, whether it be in public or private k you and good night.
经典英语演讲稿14
Hello, ladies and gentlemen. I’m Angela zhang from class 4 grade 8. Today, my topic is, “The Shanghai world Expo”.
First, I’ll say something about world Expo History. As we know, the very first world Expo, the great Exhibition of 1851, took place in the crystal Palace in London. UK. Ever since then, the goals of world Expos have been both high-minded as well as commercial. Visitors are able to explore the world outside of their everyday experience—outside cultures, new scientific advancements, and new inventions. world Expos have excited and inspired more and more people in the december3, 20xx, the Bureau of International Expositions (or call it BIE) announced that Shanghai will host Expo20xx. the BIE had received bids from five cities to host Expo20xx. Among the 5 nice cities, the BIE chose Shanghai at last! It’s really an exciting news for not only Shanghainese, but also all of chinese people. Here are some details about it.
Look at this profile carefully. The title is “The 20xx world Exposition ,Shanghai, china ”. this is the logo.
And the theme is “better city., better life”, let’s guess who is the image representative? Yeah, you’re right, Yao ming!Shanghai Expo is the first comprehensive world Expo held in a developing country. And it is also the first one that takes “the city” as its theme, hoping that it can push forward the city development and help bring about a better urban living environment, just like the theme: better city, better life.
I think, as a student in Shanghai, we should learn to be a gentle person and keep good manners from now on. And try to practice English more in order to communicate with foreigners fluently in the near future. Because, we’re a part of Shanghai!
经典英语演讲稿15
What I'd like to do today is talk about one of my favorite subjects, and that is the neuroscience of sleep.
Now, there is a sound -- (Alarm clock) -- aah, it worked -- a sound that is desperately, desperately familiar to most of us, and of course it's the sound of the alarm clock. And what that truly ghastly, awful sound does is stop the single most important behavioral experience that we have, and that's sleep. If you're an average sort of person, 36 percent of your life will be spent asleep, which means that if you live to 90, then 32 years will have been spent entirely asleep.
Now what that 32 years is telling us is that sleep at some level is important. And yet, for most of us, we don't give sleep a second thought. We throw it away. We really just don't think about sleep. And so what I'd like to do today is change your views, change your ideas and your thoughts about sleep. And the journey that I want to take you on, we need to start by going back in time.
"Enjoy the honey-heavy dew of slumber." Any ideas who said that? Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. Yes, let me give you a few more quotes. "O sleep, O gentle sleep, nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee?" Shakespeare again, from -- I won't say it -- the Scottish play. [Correction: Henry IV, Part 2] (Laughter) From the same time: "Sleep is the golden chain that ties health and our bodies together." Extremely prophetic, by Thomas Dekker, another Elizabethan dramatist.
But if we jump forward 400 years, the tone about sleep changes somewhat. This is from Thomas Edison, from the beginning of the 20th century. "Sleep is a criminal waste of time and a heritage from our cave days." Bang. (Laughter) And if we also jump into the 1980s, some of you may remember that Margaret Thatcher was reported to have said, "Sleep is for wimps." And of course the infamous -- what was his name? -- the infamous Gordon Gekko from "Wall Street" said, "Money never sleeps."
What do we do in the 20th century about sleep? Well, of course, we use Thomas Edison's light bulb to invade the night, and we occupied the dark, and in the process of this occupation, we've treated sleep as an illness, almost. We've treated it as an enemy. At most now, I suppose, we tolerate the need for sleep, and at worst perhaps many of us think of sleep as an illness that needs some sort of a cure. And our ignorance about sleep is really quite profound.
Why is it? Why do we abandon sleep in our thoughts? Well, it's because you don't do anything much while you're asleep, it seems. You don't eat. You don't drink. And you don't have sex. Well, most of us anyway. And so therefore it's -- Sorry. It's a complete waste of time, right? Wrong. Actually, sleep is an incredibly important part of our biology, and neuroscientists are beginning to explain why it's so very important. So let's move to the brain.
Now, here we have a brain. This is donated by a social scientist, and they said they didn't know what it was, or indeed how to use it, so -- (Laughter) Sorry. So I borrowed it. I don't think they noticed. Okay. (Laughter)
The point I'm trying to make is that when you're asleep, this thing doesn't shut down. In fact, some areas of the brain are actually more active during the sleep state than during the wake state. The other thing that's really important about sleep is that it doesn't arise from a single structure within the brain, but is to some extent a network property, and if we flip the brain on its back -- I love this little bit of spinal cord here -- this bit here is the hypothalamus, and right under there is a whole raft of interesting structures, not least the biological clock. The biological clock tells us when it's good to be up, when it's good to be asleep, and what that structure does is interact with a whole raft of other areas within the hypothalamus, the lateral hypothalamus, the ventrolateral preoptic nuclei. All of those combine, and they send projections down to the brain stem here. The brain stem then projects forward and bathes the cortex, this wonderfully wrinkly bit over here, with neurotransmitters that keep us awake and essentially provide us with our consciousness. So sleep arises from a whole raft of different interactions within the brain, and essentially, sleep is turned on and off as a result of a range of
Okay. So where have we got to? We've said that sleep is complicated and it takes 32 years of our life. But what I haven't explained is what sleep is about. So why do we sleep? And it won't surprise any of you that, of course, the scientists, we don't have a consensus. There are dozens of different ideas about why we sleep, and I'm going to outline three of those.
The first is sort of the restoration idea, and it's somewhat intuitive. Essentially, all the stuff we've burned up during the day, we restore, we replace, we rebuild during the night. And indeed, as an explanation, it goes back to Aristotle, so that's, what, 2,300 years ago. It's gone in and out of fashion. It's fashionable at the moment because what's been shown is that within the brain, a whole raft of genes have been shown to be turned on only during sleep, and those genes are associated with restoration and metabolic pathways. So there's good evidence for the whole restoration hypothesis.
What about energy conservation? Again, perhaps intuitive. You essentially sleep to save calories. Now, when you do the sums, though, it doesn't really pan out. If you compare an individual who has slept at night, or stayed awake and hasn't moved very much, the energy saving of sleeping is about 110 calories a night. Now, that's the equivalent of a hot dog bun. Now, I would say that a hot dog bun is kind of a meager return for such a complicated and demanding behavior as sleep. So I'm less convinced by the energy conservation idea.
But the third idea I'm quite attracted to, which is brain processing and memory consolidation. What we know is that, if after you've tried to learn a task, and you sleep-deprive individuals, the ability to learn that task is smashed. It's really hugely attenuated. So sleep and memory consolidation is also very important. However, it's not just the laying down of memory and recalling it. What's turned out to be really exciting is that our ability to come up with novel solutions to complex problems is hugely enhanced by a night of sleep. In fact, it's been estimated to give us a threefold advantage. Sleeping at night enhances our creativity. And what seems to be going on is that, in the brain, those neural connections that are important, those synaptic connections that are important, are linked and strengthened, while those that are less important tend to fade away and be less important.
Okay. So we've had three explanations for why we might sleep, and I think the important thing to realize is that the details will vary, and it's probable we sleep for multiple different reasons. But sleep is not an indulgence. It's not some sort of thing that we can take on board rather casually. I think that sleep was once likened to an upgrade from economy to business class, you know, the equiavlent of. It's not even an upgrade from economy to first class. The critical thing to realize is that if you don't sleep, you don't fly. Essentially, you never get there, and what's extraordinary about much of our society these days is that we are desperately sleep-deprived.
So let's now look at sleep deprivation. Huge sectors of society are sleep-deprived, and let's look at our sleep-o-meter. So in the 1950s, good data suggests that most of us were getting around about eight hours of sleep a night. Nowadays, we sleep one and a half to two hours less every night, so we're in the six-and-a-half-hours-every-night league. For teenagers, it's worse, much worse. They need nine hours for full brain performance, and many of them, on a school night, are only getting five hours of sleep. It's simply not enough. If we think about other sectors of society, the aged, if you are aged, then your ability to sleep in a single block is somewhat disrupted, and many sleep, again, less than five hours a night. Shift work. Shift work is extraordinary, perhaps 20 percent of the working population, and the body clock does not shift to the demands of working at night. It's locked onto the same light-dark cycle as the rest of us. So when the poor old shift worker is going home to try and sleep during the day, desperately tired, the body clock is saying, "Wake up. This is the time to be awake." So the quality of sleep that you get as a night shift worker is usually very poor, again in that sort of five-hour region. And then, of course, tens of millions of people suffer from jet lag. So who here has jet lag? Well, my goodness gracious. Well, thank you very much indeed for not falling asleep, because that's what your brain is craving.
One of the things that the brain does is indulge in micro-sleeps, this involuntary falling asleep, and you have essentially no control over it. Now, micro-sleeps can be sort of somewhat embarrassing, but they can also be deadly. It's been estimated that 31 percent of drivers will fall asleep at the wheel at least once in their life, and in the U.S., the statistics are pretty good: 100,000 accidents on the freeway have been associated with tiredness, loss of vigilance, and falling asleep. A hundred thousand a year. It's extraordinary. At another level of terror, we dip into the tragic accidents at Chernobyl and indeed the space shuttle Challenger, which was so tragically lost. And in the investigations that followed those disasters, poor judgment as a result of extended shift work and loss of vigilance and tiredness was attributed to a big chunk of those disasters.
So when you're tired, and you lack sleep, you have poor memory, you have poor creativity, you have increased impulsiveness, and you have overall poor judgment. But my friends, it's so much worse than that.
(Laughter)
If you are a tired brain, the brain is craving things to wake it up. So drugs, stimulants. Caffeine represents the stimulant of choice across much of the Western world. Much of the day is fueled by caffeine, and if you're a really naughty tired brain, nicotine. And of course, you're fueling the waking state with these stimulants, and then of course it gets to 11 o'clock at night, and the brain says to itself, "Ah, well actually, I need to be asleep fairly shortly. What do we do about that when I'm feeling completely wired?" Well, of course, you then resort to alcohol. Now alcohol, short-term, you know, once or twice, to use to mildly sedate you, can be very useful. It can actually ease the sleep transition. But what you must be so aware of is that alcohol doesn't provide sleep, a biological mimic for sleep. It sedates you. So it actually harms some of the neural proccessing that's going on during memory consolidation and memory recall. So it's a short-term acute measure, but for goodness sake, don't become addicted to alcohol as a way of getting to sleep every night.
Another connection between loss of sleep is weight gain. If you sleep around about five hours or less every night, then you have a 50 percent likelihood of being obese. What's the connection here? Well, sleep loss seems to give rise to the release of the hormone ghrelin, the hunger hormone. Ghrelin is released. It gets to the brain. The brain says, "I need carbohydrates," and what it does is seek out carbohydrates and particularly sugars. So there's a link between tiredness and the metabolic predisposition for weight gain.
Stress. Tired people are massively stressed. And one of the things of stress, of course, is loss of memory, which is what I sort of just then had a little lapse of. But stress is so much more. So if you're acutely stressed, not a great problem, but it's sustained stress associated with sleep loss that's the problem. So sustained stress leads to suppressed immunity, and so tired people tend to have higher rates of overall infection, and there's some very good studies showing that shift workers, for example, have higher rates of cancer. Increased levels of stress throw glucose into the circulation. Glucose becomes a dominant part of the vasculature and essentially you become glucose intolerant. Therefore, diabetes 2. Stress increases cardiovascular disease as a result of raising blood pressure. So there's a whole raft of things associated with sleep loss that are more than just a mildly impaired brain, which is where I think most people think that sleep loss resides.
So at this point in the talk, this is a nice time to think, well, do you think on the whole I'm getting enough sleep? So a quick show of hands. Who feels that they're getting enough sleep here? Oh. Well, that's pretty impressive. Good. We'll talk more about that later, about what are your tips.
So most of us, of course, ask the question, "Well, how do I know whether I'm getting enough sleep?" Well, it's not rocket science. If you need an alarm clock to get you out of bed in the morning, if you are taking a long time to get up, if you need lots of stimulants, if you're grumpy, if you're irritable, if you're told by your work colleagues that you're looking tired and irritable, chances are you are sleep-deprived. Listen to them. Listen to yourself.
What do you do? Well -- and this is slightly offensive -- sleep for dummies: Make your bedroom a haven for sleep. The first critical thing is make it as dark as you possibly can, and also make it slightly cool. Very important. Actually, reduce your amount of light exposure at least half an hour before you go to bed. Light increases levels of alertness and will delay sleep. What's the last thing that most of us do before we go to bed? We stand in a massively lit bathroom looking into the mirror cleaning our teeth. It's the worst thing we can possibly do before we went to sleep. Turn off those mobile phones. Turn off those computers. Turn off all of those things that are also going to excite the brain. Try not to drink caffeine too late in the day, ideally not after lunch. Now, we've set about reducing light exposure before you go to bed, but light exposure in the morning is very good at setting the biological clock to the light-dark cycle. So seek out morning light. Basically, listen to yourself. Wind down. Do those sorts of things that you know are going to ease you off into the honey-heavy dew of slumber.
Okay. That's some facts. What about some myths?
Teenagers are lazy. No. Poor things. They have a biological predisposition to go to bed late and get up late, so give them a break.
We need eight hours of sleep a night. That's an average. Some people need more. Some people need less. And what you need to do is listen to your body. Do you need that much or do you need more? Simple as that.
Old people need less sleep. Not true. The sleep demands of the aged do not go down. Essentially, sleep fragments and becomes less robust, but sleep requirements do not go down.
And the fourth myth is, early to bed, early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise. Well that's wrong at so many different levels. (Laughter) There is no, no evidence that getting up early and going to bed early gives you more wealth at all. There's no difference in socioeconomic status. In my experience, the only difference between morning people and evening people is that those people that get up in the morning early are just horribly smug.
(Laughter) (Applause)
Okay. So for the last part, the last few minutes, what I want to do is change gears and talk about some really new, breaking areas of neuroscience, which is the association between mental health, mental illness and sleep disruption. We've known for 130 years that in severe mental illness, there is always, always sleep disruption, but it's been largely ignored. In the 1970s, when people started to think about this again, they said, "Yes, well, of course you have sleep disruption in schizophrenia because they're on anti-psychotics. It's the anti-psychotics causing the sleep problems," ignoring the fact that for a hundred years previously, sleep disruption had been reported before anti-psychotics.
So what's going on? Lots of groups, several groups are studying conditions like depression, schizophrenia and bipolar, and what's going on in terms of sleep disruption. We have a big study which we published last year on schizophrenia, and the data were quite extraordinary. In those individuals with schizophrenia, much of the time, they were awake during the night phase and then they were asleep during the day. Other groups showed no 24-hour patterns whatsoever. Their sleep was absolutely smashed. And some had no ability to regulate their sleep by the light-dark cycle. They were getting up later and later and later and later each night. It was smashed.
So what's going on? And the really exciting news is that mental illness and sleep are not simply associated but they are physically linked within the brain. The neural networks that predispose you to normal sleep, give you normal sleep, and those that give you normal mental health are overlapping. And what's the evidence for that? Well, genes that have been shown to be very important in the generation of normal sleep, when mutated, when changed, also predispose individuals to mental health problems. And last year, we published a study which showed that a gene that's been linked to schizophrenia, which, when mutated, also smashes the sleep. So we have evidence of a genuine mechanistic overlap between these two important systems.
Other work flowed from these studies. The first was that sleep disruption actually precedes certain types of mental illness, and we've shown that in those young individuals who are at high risk of developing bipolar disorder, they already have a sleep abnormality prior to any clinical diagnosis of bipolar. The other bit of data was that sleep disruption may actually exacerbate, make worse the mental illness state. My colleague Dan Freeman has used a range of agents which have stabilized sleep and reduced levels of paranoia in those individuals by 50 percent.
So what have we got? We've got, in these connections, some really exciting things. In terms of the neuroscience, by understanding the neuroscience of these two systems, we're really beginning to understand how both sleep and mental illness are generated and regulated within the brain. The second area is that if we can use sleep and sleep disruption as an early warning signal, then we have the chance of going in. If we know that these individuals are vulnerable, early intervention then becomes possible. And the third, which I think is the most exciting, is that we can think of the sleep centers within the brain as a new therapeutic target. Stabilize sleep in those individuals who are vulnerable, we can certainly make them healthier, but also alleviate some of the appalling symptoms of mental illness.
So let me just finish. What I started by saying is take sleep seriously. Our attitudes toward sleep are so very different from a pre-industrial age, when we were almost wrapped in a duvet. We used to understand intuitively the importance of sleep. And this isn't some sort of crystal-waving nonsense. This is a pragmatic response to good health. If you have good sleep, it increases your concentration, attention, decision-making, creativity, social skills, health. If you get sleep, it reduces your mood changes, your stress, your levels of anger, your impulsivity, and your tendency to drink and take drugs. And we finished by saying that an understanding of the neuroscience of sleep is really informing the way we think about some of the causes of mental illness, and indeed is providing us new ways to treat these incredibly debilitating conditions.
Jim Butcher, the fantasy writer, said, "Sleep is God. Go worship." And I can only recommend that you do the same.
Thank you for your attention.
(Applause)
