sleep-deprived

American

[sleep-di-prahyvd] / ˈslip dɪˌpraɪvd /

adjective

affected by fatigue, weakness, impaired judgment, loss of mental alertness, etc., due to lack of sleep.

I wasn’t going to wait in line overnight and then be in a store with 700 other sleep-deprived shoppers, any of whom could mentally snap and strangle me at any moment.
If you know you’re going to have a sleep-deprived EEG, plan to have someone drive you to and from the test.

Etymology

Origin of sleep-deprived

First recorded in 1950–55

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

New research shows what happens in the sleep-deprived brain.

From The Wall Street Journal

Attention lapses when we’re sleep-deprived result from our brain’s efforts to clean itself up, a process that usually happens during sleep, recent research found.

From The Wall Street Journal

While some can handle a disrupted sleep schedule better than others, all sleep-deprived people who participated in the study experienced this effect, Lewis said.

From The Wall Street Journal

Sleep-deprived participants had slower reactions, or missed visual and auditory cues.

From The Wall Street Journal

Today I slept pretty good but usually I’m pretty sleep-deprived, overworked, and we’ve got a lot going on.

From Los Angeles Times

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023