An author and a professor, he taught a popular and entertaining psychology course at Cornell that focused on the importance of sleep, including “power naps.”
James B. Maas, a social psychologist who in books and lectures was an evangelist for the many health benefits of a good night’s sleep — or even a short power nap at work — died on June 23 in Charlevoix, Mich. He was 86.
His wife, Nancy Neaher Maas, said he died of heart failure in their summer home. Their primary residence was in Frisco, Texas.
Professor Maas taught an introductory psychology course at Cornell University each fall for nearly 50 years. It became so popular that it had to be moved from a lecture hall to an auditorium that could seat more than 1,000 students.
In 1969, five years after starting the course, he said that he began to add the findings of sleep research — mostly done by others — to his course. He had been inspired to explore the psychology and dynamics of sleep while making a film about the psychiatry professor Dr. William Dement, a pioneering sleep researcher at Stanford University; Professor Maas was riveted by one student’s recollection of a pre-dawn dream during REM (rapid eye movement) sleep.
“I was so fascinated by watching this one episode that I said to myself by the time morning came, ‘I’m going to spend the rest of my professional life studying sleep,’” he said on a 2017 GDA Speakers podcast. “I was just trying to make a short film for my class, because sleep is a soporific topic, and I’m talking to very tired kids. So I wanted to jazz it up a bit by showing a film, and that one night changed my life.”
Professor Maas surveyed his students about their sleep habits, and he devoted part of each semester to what happens during sleep, how sleep affects people and why so many don’t get enough of it. In his view, sleep was as critical as nutrition and exercise.