Rest may not benefit old people''s memories
15/11/2011
Sleep is often promoted for its restorative functions, but these may not be apparent in older generations, a study has found.
Lauri Kurdziel and Rebecca Spencer from the University of Massachusetts Amherst discovered that the memory fails to be improved through sleep as a person gets older.
Participants in the study were asked to learn a sequence of coloured doors, before being tested 12 hours later, either after a night in bed or in the evening of the same day.
Young people who took the test after being awake all day made an average of ten errors, which was halved after they had slept.
However, the older generation made just as many mistakes before and after they had been to bed.
Ms Spencer commented: "Each sleep stage is accomplishing a different function for our cognitive abilities.
"We think during deep sleep (slow wave sleep) you are literally replaying a memory from the day."
Posted by Michael Ewing
