<figcaption>For an hour each morning Seth Roberts gazes at his own visage in the mirror. His experiments have convinced him that the practice elevates his mood. Credit: Courtesy of Gordy Slack</figcaption>
For an hour each morning Seth Roberts gazes at his own visage in the mirror. His experiments have convinced him that the practice elevates his mood. Credit: Courtesy of Gordy Slack

The last thing Seth Roberts does each night is turn on his bedside timer, and the first thing he does each morning is switch it off. He has tracked his own sleep for more than 30 years and all those data are stored and crunchable along with the many factors he suspects influence his slumber.

As his day job Roberts, an associate professor of psychology, studies animal behavior at the University of California at Berkeley. His self-study is "a hobby," he says. But he clearly thinks it's a hobby with a lot to offer the world of science. He outlined his methodologies and some of his results in a 2004 paper in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, and is...

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