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Harrington MO, Karapanagiotidis T, Phillips L, Smallwood J, Anderson MC, Cairney SA. Memory control deficits in the sleep-deprived human brain. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2025; 122:e2400743122. [PMID: 39739795 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2400743122] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/17/2024] [Accepted: 12/02/2024] [Indexed: 01/02/2025] Open
Abstract
Sleep disturbances are associated with intrusive memories, but the neurocognitive mechanisms underpinning this relationship are poorly understood. Here, we show that sleep deprivation disrupts prefrontal inhibition of memory retrieval, and that the overnight restoration of this inhibitory mechanism is associated with time spent in rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. The functional impairments arising from sleep deprivation are linked to a behavioral deficit in the ability to downregulate unwanted memories, and coincide with a deterioration of deliberate patterns of self-generated thought. We conclude that sleep deprivation gives rise to intrusive memories via the disruption of neural circuits governing mnemonic inhibitory control, which may rely on REM sleep.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marcus O Harrington
- Department of Psychology, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
- School of Psychology, University of East Anglia, Norwich NR4 7TJ, United Kingdom
| | | | - Lauryn Phillips
- Department of Psychology, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
| | | | - Michael C Anderson
- Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 7EF, United Kingdom
| | - Scott A Cairney
- Department of Psychology, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
- York Biomedical Research Institute, University of York, York YO10 5NG, United Kingdom
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2
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Guttesen AÁV, Denis D, Gaskell MG, Cairney SA. Delineating memory reactivation in sleep with verbal and non-verbal retrieval cues. Cereb Cortex 2024; 34:bhae183. [PMID: 38745557 PMCID: PMC11094403 DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhae183] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/09/2023] [Revised: 04/12/2024] [Accepted: 04/16/2024] [Indexed: 05/16/2024] Open
Abstract
Sleep supports memory consolidation via the reactivation of newly formed memory traces. One way to investigate memory reactivation in sleep is by exposing the sleeping brain to auditory retrieval cues; a paradigm known as targeted memory reactivation. To what extent the acoustic properties of memory cues influence the effectiveness of targeted memory reactivation, however, has received limited attention. We addressed this question by exploring how verbal and non-verbal memory cues affect oscillatory activity linked to memory reactivation in sleep. Fifty-one healthy male adults learned to associate visual stimuli with spoken words (verbal cues) and environmental sounds (non-verbal cues). Subsets of the verbal and non-verbal memory cues were then replayed during sleep. The voice of the verbal cues was either matched or mismatched to learning. Memory cues (relative to unheard control cues) prompted an increase in theta/alpha and spindle power, which have been heavily implicated in sleep-associated memory processing. Moreover, verbal memory cues were associated with a stronger increase in spindle power than non-verbal memory cues. There were no significant differences between the matched and mismatched verbal cues. Our findings suggest that verbal memory cues may be most effective for triggering memory reactivation in sleep, as indicated by an amplified spindle response.
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Affiliation(s)
- Anna á V Guttesen
- Department of Psychology, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
- Wellcome Centre for Integrative Neuroimaging, Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Oxford OX3 9DU, United Kingdom
| | - Dan Denis
- Department of Psychology, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
- York Biomedical Research Institute, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
| | - M Gareth Gaskell
- Department of Psychology, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
- York Biomedical Research Institute, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
| | - Scott A Cairney
- Department of Psychology, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
- York Biomedical Research Institute, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
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3
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Mak MHC, O'Hagan A, Horner AJ, Gaskell MG. A registered report testing the effect of sleep on Deese-Roediger-McDermott false memory: greater lure and veridical recall but fewer intrusions after sleep. ROYAL SOCIETY OPEN SCIENCE 2023; 10:220595. [PMID: 38077219 PMCID: PMC10698482 DOI: 10.1098/rsos.220595] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/05/2022] [Accepted: 11/14/2023] [Indexed: 12/14/2024]
Abstract
Human memory is known to be supported by sleep. However, less is known about the effect of sleep on false memory, where people incorrectly remember events that never occurred. In the laboratory, false memories are often induced via the Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) paradigm where participants are presented with wordlists comprising semantically related words such as nurse, hospital and sick (studied words). Subsequently, participants are likely to falsely remember that a related lure word such as doctor was presented. Multiple studies have examined whether these false memories are influenced by sleep, with contradictory results. A recent meta-analysis suggests that sleep may increase DRM false memory when short lists are used. We tested this in a registered report (N = 488) with a 2 (Interval: Immediate versus 12 h delay) × 2 (Test Time: 9:00 versus 21:00) between-participant DRM experiment, using short DRM lists (N = 8 words/list) and free recall as the memory test. We found an unexpected time-of-day effect such that completing free recall in the evening led to more intrusions (neither studied nor lure words). Above and beyond this time-of-day effect, the Sleep participants produced fewer intrusions than their Wake counterparts. When this was statistically controlled for, the Sleep participants falsely produced more critical lures. They also correctly recalled more studied words (regardless of intrusions). Exploratory analysis showed that these findings cannot be attributed to differences in output bias, as indexed by the number of total responses. Our overall results cannot be fully captured by existing sleep-specific theories of false memory, but help to define the role of sleep in two more general theories (Fuzzy-Trace and Activation/Monitoring theories) and suggest that sleep may benefit gist abstraction/spreading activation on one hand and memory suppression/source monitoring on the other.
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Affiliation(s)
- Matthew H. C. Mak
- Department of Psychology, University of York, Heslington, York YO10 5DD, UK
| | - Alice O'Hagan
- Department of Psychology, University of York, Heslington, York YO10 5DD, UK
| | - Aidan J. Horner
- Department of Psychology, University of York, Heslington, York YO10 5DD, UK
| | - M. Gareth Gaskell
- Department of Psychology, University of York, Heslington, York YO10 5DD, UK
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4
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Denis D, Bottary R, Cunningham TJ, Tcheukado MC, Payne JD. The influence of encoding strategy on associative memory consolidation across wake and sleep. Learn Mem 2023; 30:185-191. [PMID: 37726141 PMCID: PMC10547373 DOI: 10.1101/lm.053765.123] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/21/2023] [Accepted: 07/19/2023] [Indexed: 09/21/2023]
Abstract
Sleep benefits memory consolidation. However, factors present at initial encoding may moderate this effect. Here, we examined the role that encoding strategy plays in subsequent memory consolidation during sleep. Eighty-nine participants encoded pairs of words using two different strategies. Each participant encoded half of the word pairs using an integrative visualization technique, where the two items were imagined in an integrated scene. The other half were encoded nonintegratively, with each word pair item visualized separately. Memory was tested before and after a period of nocturnal sleep (N = 47) or daytime wake (N = 42) via cued recall tests. Immediate memory performance was significantly better for word pairs encoded using the integrative strategy compared with the nonintegrative strategy (P < 0.001). When looking at the change in recall across the delay, there was significantly less forgetting of integrated word pairs across a night of sleep compared with a day spent awake (P < 0.001), with no significant difference in the nonintegrated pairs (P = 0.19). This finding was driven by more forgetting of integrated compared with not-integrated pairs across the wake delay (P < 0.001), whereas forgetting was equivalent across the sleep delay (P = 0.26). Together, these results show that the strategy engaged in during encoding impacts both the immediate retention of memories and their subsequent consolidation across sleep and wake intervals.
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Affiliation(s)
- Dan Denis
- Department of Psychology, University of York, York YO10 5DD, United Kingdom
| | - Ryan Bottary
- Institute for Graduate Clinical Psychology, Widener University, Chester, Pennsylvania 19013, USA
| | - Tony J Cunningham
- Center for Sleep and Cognition, Psychiatry Department, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, Massachusetts 02215, USA
- Division of Sleep Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02215, USA
| | | | - Jessica D Payne
- Department of Psychology, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana 46556, USA
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Wernette EMD, Fenn KM. Consolidation without intention: Sleep strengthens veridical and gist representations of information after incidental encoding. Psychon Bull Rev 2023; 30:1475-1483. [PMID: 36800068 DOI: 10.3758/s13423-023-02247-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 01/15/2023] [Indexed: 02/18/2023]
Abstract
Sleep strengthens declarative memory, but research investigating the effect of sleep on memory for information that is not explicitly studied for a test is sparse. In two experiments, we investigated the effect of sleep on gist-based and veridical representations of incidentally encoded information. Participants rated words from Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) lists in either a deep or shallow encoding task and completed a surprise memory test after either sleep or wake. In Experiment 1, words were presented in lists, in order of descending associativity with the unpresented critical lure. Memory for list words and critical lures in both encoding tasks was stronger after sleep than wake, suggesting that sleep consolidated gist-based memory. In Experiment 2, the same words were presented in a random order across the experiment to minimize gist-based processing. Sleep strengthened veridical memory for list words following deep, but not shallow, encoding and did not affect critical lures. These results suggest sleep consolidates gist and veridical representations of information after incidental encoding, and that sleep-dependent consolidation processes may depend on processes at encoding, such as overlapping context and the strength of veridical memory traces.
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Affiliation(s)
- Elle M D Wernette
- Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, 316 Physics Road, Room 213, East Lansing, MI, 48824, USA.
| | - Kimberly M Fenn
- Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, 316 Physics Road, Room 213, East Lansing, MI, 48824, USA
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Guttesen AÁV, Gaskell MG, Madden EV, Appleby G, Cross ZR, Cairney SA. Sleep loss disrupts the neural signature of successful learning. Cereb Cortex 2023; 33:1610-1625. [PMID: 35470400 PMCID: PMC9977378 DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhac159] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/06/2021] [Revised: 03/31/2022] [Accepted: 04/01/2022] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Sleep supports memory consolidation as well as next-day learning. The influential "Active Systems" account of offline consolidation suggests that sleep-associated memory processing paves the way for new learning, but empirical evidence in support of this idea is scarce. Using a within-subjects (n = 30), crossover design, we assessed behavioral and electrophysiological indices of episodic encoding after a night of sleep or total sleep deprivation in healthy adults (aged 18-25 years) and investigated whether behavioral performance was predicted by the overnight consolidation of episodic associations from the previous day. Sleep supported memory consolidation and next-day learning as compared to sleep deprivation. However, the magnitude of this sleep-associated consolidation benefit did not significantly predict the ability to form novel memories after sleep. Interestingly, sleep deprivation prompted a qualitative change in the neural signature of encoding: Whereas 12-20 Hz beta desynchronization-an established marker of successful encoding-was observed after sleep, sleep deprivation disrupted beta desynchrony during successful learning. Taken together, these findings suggest that effective learning depends on sleep but not necessarily on sleep-associated consolidation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Anna á V Guttesen
- Department of Psychology, University of York, Heslington, York, YO10 5DD, UK
| | - M Gareth Gaskell
- Department of Psychology, University of York, Heslington, York, YO10 5DD, UK
- York Biomedical Research Institute, University of York, Heslington, York, YO10 5DD, UK
| | - Emily V Madden
- Department of Psychology, University of York, Heslington, York, YO10 5DD, UK
| | - Gabrielle Appleby
- Department of Psychology, University of York, Heslington, York, YO10 5DD, UK
| | - Zachariah R Cross
- Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, Australian Research Centre for Interactive and Virtual Environments, Mawson Lakes Campus, Mawson Lakes, South Australia 5095, Australia
| | - Scott A Cairney
- Department of Psychology, University of York, Heslington, York, YO10 5DD, UK
- York Biomedical Research Institute, University of York, Heslington, York, YO10 5DD, UK
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Sleep preferentially consolidates negative aspects of human memory: Well-powered evidence from two large online experiments. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2022; 119:e2202657119. [PMID: 36279434 PMCID: PMC9636942 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2202657119] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Recent research has called into question whether sleep improves memory, especially for emotional information. However, many of these studies used a relatively small number of participants and focused only on college student samples, limiting both the power of these findings and their generalizability to the wider population. Here, using the well-established emotional memory trade-off task, we investigated sleep’s impact on memory for emotional components of scenes in a large online sample of adults ranging in age from 18 to 59 y. Despite the limitations inherent in using online samples, this well-powered study provides strong evidence that sleep selectively consolidates negative emotional aspects of memory and that this effect generalizes to participants across young adulthood and middle age. Research suggests that sleep benefits memory. Moreover, it is often claimed that sleep selectively benefits memory for emotionally salient information over neutral information. However, not all scientists are convinced by this relationship [e.g., J. M. Siegel. Curr. Sleep Med. Rep., 7, 15–18 (2021)]. One criticism of the overall sleep and memory literature—like other literature—is that many studies are underpowered and lacking in generalizability [M. J. Cordi, B. Rasch. Curr. Opin. Neurobiol., 67, 1–7 (2021)], thus leaving the evidence mixed and confusing to interpret. Because large replication studies are sorely needed, we recruited over 250 participants spanning various age ranges and backgrounds in an effort to confirm sleep’s preferential emotional memory consolidation benefit using a well-established task. We found that sleep selectively benefits memory for negative emotional objects at the expense of their paired neutral backgrounds, confirming our prior work and clearly demonstrating a role for sleep in emotional memory formation. In a second experiment also using a large sample, we examined whether this effect generalized to positive emotional memory. We found that while participants demonstrated better memory for positive objects compared to their neutral backgrounds, sleep did not modulate this effect. This research provides strong support for a sleep-specific benefit on memory consolidation for specifically negative information and more broadly affirms the benefit of sleep for cognition.
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Ashton JE, Staresina BP, Cairney SA. Sleep bolsters schematically incongruent memories. PLoS One 2022; 17:e0269439. [PMID: 35749391 PMCID: PMC9231735 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0269439] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/05/2021] [Accepted: 05/21/2022] [Indexed: 11/25/2022] Open
Abstract
Our ability to recall memories is improved when sleep follows learning, suggesting that sleep facilitates memory consolidation. A number of factors are thought to influence the impact of sleep on newly learned information, such as whether or not we rehearse that information (e.g. via restudy or retrieval practice), or the extent to which the information is consistent with our pre-existing schematic knowledge. In this pre-registered, online study, we examined the effects of both rehearsal and schematic congruency on overnight consolidation. Participants learned noun-colour pairings (e.g. elephant-red) and rated each pairing as plausible or implausible before completing a baseline memory assessment. Afterwards, participants engaged in a period of restudy or retrieval practice for the pairings, and then entered a 12 h retention interval of overnight sleep or daytime wakefulness. Follow-up assessments were completed immediately after sleep or wake, and again 24 h after learning. Our data indicated that overnight consolidation was amplified for restudied relative to retested noun-colour pairings, but only when sleep occurred soon after learning. Furthermore, whereas plausible (i.e. schematically congruent) pairings were generally better remembered than implausible (i.e. schematically incongruent) pairings, the benefits of sleep were stronger for implausible relative to plausible memories. These findings challenge the notion that schema-conformant memories are preferentially strengthened during post-learning sleep.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | - Scott A. Cairney
- Department of Psychology, University of York, York, United Kingdom
- York Biomedical Research Institute, University of York, York, United Kingdom
- * E-mail:
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