Benjamin Keep, PhD, JD | Can you learn in your sleep? @benjaminkeep | Uploaded May 2022 | Updated October 2024, 30 minutes ago.
Amazing things happen to your brain when you sleep - no special products needed. Just sit back, relax, and learn how sleep helps you learn.
00:00 Introduction
00:27 Sleep and learning contexts
2:27 Sleep and long-term learning
3:03 Sleep and procedural learning
3:23 Sleep hacking is possible
4:10 Getting more sleep is really good
Sign up to my email newsletter, Avoiding Folly, here: benjaminkeep.com
Footage sources:
Thanks to the Sleep Disorders Center in Florida for providing the psychomotor vigilance test. Check it out here: sleepdisordersflorida.com/pvt1.html
The "sleep stages" animation is based on an image found here: Diekelmann, S., & Born, J. (2010). The memory function of sleep. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 11(2), 114-126.
References
As you might expect, I have simplified and ignored a fair amount of the research on sleeping and learning (there's a lot of it!). For a great overview of some of the complexities, see:
Diekelmann, S., Wilhelm, I., & Born, J. (2009). The whats and whens of sleep-dependent memory consolidation. Sleep medicine reviews, 13(5), 309-321. sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1087079208001020
Among the complexities: declarative and non-declarative memories rely on somewhat different systems that can interact while we sleep. REM sleep also contributes to memory consolidation and learning, but seems to be more strongly associated with procedural memory and "initial" memory consolidation.
The study finding an association between slow-wave sleep and long-term learning is here:
Alger, S. E., Lau, H., & Fishbein, W. (2012). Slow wave sleep during a daytime nap is necessary for protection from subsequent interference and long-term retention. Neurobiology of learning and memory, 98(2), 188-196. sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1074742712000780
The "sleep extracting the gist" study with the word triplets is here:
Diekelmann, S., Born, J., & Wagner, U. (2010). Sleep enhances false memories depending on general memory performance. Behavioural brain research, 208(2), 425-429. sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0166432809007475 The "gist" effect only occurred for people who didn't remember the words that well in the first place.
The study on video game problem solving is here:
Beijamini, F., Pereira, S. I. R., Cini, F. A., & Louzada, F. M. (2014). After being challenged by a video game problem, sleep increases the chance to solve it. PloS one, 9(1), e84342. journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0084342&type=printable
On finger tapping, this contains a good discussion in the intro on the basic findings:
Tamaki, M., Huang, T. R., Yotsumoto, Y., Hämäläinen, M., Lin, F. H., Náñez, J. E., ... & Sasaki, Y. (2013). Enhanced spontaneous oscillations in the supplementary motor area are associated with sleep-dependent offline learning of finger-tapping motor-sequence task. Journal of Neuroscience, 33(34), 13894-13902. jneurosci.org/content/jneuro/33/34/13894.full.pdf
The "sleep hacking with smells" idea comes from this study:
Rasch, B., Büchel, C., Gais, S., & Born, J. (2007). Odor cues during slow-wave sleep prompt declarative memory consolidation. Science, 315(5817), 1426-1429. http://mechanism.ucsd.edu/~bill/teaching/f16/cogs200/rasch.sleep%20consoldiation%20and%20order%20cues.2007.pdf
And lots of other studies support the basic idea. With tones:
Creery, J. D., Oudiette, D., Antony, J. W., & Paller, K. A. (2015). Targeted memory reactivation during sleep depends on prior learning. Sleep, 38(5), 755-763. academic.oup.com/sleep/article/38/5/755/2416966
Oudiette, D., Antony, J. W., Creery, J. D., & Paller, K. A. (2013). The role of memory reactivation during wakefulness and sleep in determining which memories endure. Journal of Neuroscience, 33(15), 6672-6678. jneurosci.org/content/jneuro/33/15/6672.full.pdf
And with words:
Schreiner, T., & Rasch, B. (2015). Boosting vocabulary learning by verbal cueing during sleep. Cerebral Cortex, 25(11), 4169-4179. academic.oup.com/cercor/article/25/11/4169/2366428
The basketball study is here:
Mah, C. D., Mah, K. E., Kezirian, E. J., & Dement, W. C. (2011). The effects of sleep extension on the athletic performance of collegiate basketball players. Sleep, 34(7), 943-950. academic.oup.com/sleep/article/34/7/943/2596050?TB_iframe=true&width=370.8&height=658.8
Amazing things happen to your brain when you sleep - no special products needed. Just sit back, relax, and learn how sleep helps you learn.
00:00 Introduction
00:27 Sleep and learning contexts
2:27 Sleep and long-term learning
3:03 Sleep and procedural learning
3:23 Sleep hacking is possible
4:10 Getting more sleep is really good
Sign up to my email newsletter, Avoiding Folly, here: benjaminkeep.com
Footage sources:
Thanks to the Sleep Disorders Center in Florida for providing the psychomotor vigilance test. Check it out here: sleepdisordersflorida.com/pvt1.html
The "sleep stages" animation is based on an image found here: Diekelmann, S., & Born, J. (2010). The memory function of sleep. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 11(2), 114-126.
References
As you might expect, I have simplified and ignored a fair amount of the research on sleeping and learning (there's a lot of it!). For a great overview of some of the complexities, see:
Diekelmann, S., Wilhelm, I., & Born, J. (2009). The whats and whens of sleep-dependent memory consolidation. Sleep medicine reviews, 13(5), 309-321. sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1087079208001020
Among the complexities: declarative and non-declarative memories rely on somewhat different systems that can interact while we sleep. REM sleep also contributes to memory consolidation and learning, but seems to be more strongly associated with procedural memory and "initial" memory consolidation.
The study finding an association between slow-wave sleep and long-term learning is here:
Alger, S. E., Lau, H., & Fishbein, W. (2012). Slow wave sleep during a daytime nap is necessary for protection from subsequent interference and long-term retention. Neurobiology of learning and memory, 98(2), 188-196. sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1074742712000780
The "sleep extracting the gist" study with the word triplets is here:
Diekelmann, S., Born, J., & Wagner, U. (2010). Sleep enhances false memories depending on general memory performance. Behavioural brain research, 208(2), 425-429. sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0166432809007475 The "gist" effect only occurred for people who didn't remember the words that well in the first place.
The study on video game problem solving is here:
Beijamini, F., Pereira, S. I. R., Cini, F. A., & Louzada, F. M. (2014). After being challenged by a video game problem, sleep increases the chance to solve it. PloS one, 9(1), e84342. journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0084342&type=printable
On finger tapping, this contains a good discussion in the intro on the basic findings:
Tamaki, M., Huang, T. R., Yotsumoto, Y., Hämäläinen, M., Lin, F. H., Náñez, J. E., ... & Sasaki, Y. (2013). Enhanced spontaneous oscillations in the supplementary motor area are associated with sleep-dependent offline learning of finger-tapping motor-sequence task. Journal of Neuroscience, 33(34), 13894-13902. jneurosci.org/content/jneuro/33/34/13894.full.pdf
The "sleep hacking with smells" idea comes from this study:
Rasch, B., Büchel, C., Gais, S., & Born, J. (2007). Odor cues during slow-wave sleep prompt declarative memory consolidation. Science, 315(5817), 1426-1429. http://mechanism.ucsd.edu/~bill/teaching/f16/cogs200/rasch.sleep%20consoldiation%20and%20order%20cues.2007.pdf
And lots of other studies support the basic idea. With tones:
Creery, J. D., Oudiette, D., Antony, J. W., & Paller, K. A. (2015). Targeted memory reactivation during sleep depends on prior learning. Sleep, 38(5), 755-763. academic.oup.com/sleep/article/38/5/755/2416966
Oudiette, D., Antony, J. W., Creery, J. D., & Paller, K. A. (2013). The role of memory reactivation during wakefulness and sleep in determining which memories endure. Journal of Neuroscience, 33(15), 6672-6678. jneurosci.org/content/jneuro/33/15/6672.full.pdf
And with words:
Schreiner, T., & Rasch, B. (2015). Boosting vocabulary learning by verbal cueing during sleep. Cerebral Cortex, 25(11), 4169-4179. academic.oup.com/cercor/article/25/11/4169/2366428
The basketball study is here:
Mah, C. D., Mah, K. E., Kezirian, E. J., & Dement, W. C. (2011). The effects of sleep extension on the athletic performance of collegiate basketball players. Sleep, 34(7), 943-950. academic.oup.com/sleep/article/34/7/943/2596050?TB_iframe=true&width=370.8&height=658.8
