Memory Medic

So we all know sleeping have many positive effect on us mentally and physically, but how many of those are just believes and how many of those are actual scientifically proven. Well recently, sleep was founded to help memory and their stability. We tend to remember things better if we sleep, than if we don't.

An experiment was done, where they ask 24 volunteers to memorize 15 pairs of location, animals and everyday objects. During the study the volunteer were exposed to an unpleasant odor, intended to be an associational cue. Then 40 minutes later the half of the volunteers were asked to study another different set of card, meant to disrupt their memories of the first set. The other half took a 20 minute nap before they start their study of the second set. The unpleasant odor again was presented to stimulate the memory of the first session. The result was as predicted, the group that got 20 minutes of sleep got 85% correct and the group that didn't got 60% correct.

This experiment seem to recreate a typical student studying for academic exams. As a college student, we seem to get less and less sleep. We stay up all night to study for tests, quiz, midterms, and finals, because thats the common thing to do. But if sleep helps memory, it seem like it would be more logical to devote sometime to sleep.

The idea is that sleep seems to protect new memories from disruption by the interfering experiences that are inevitable from when you are awake. In addition, sleep consolidates memories according to their relative importance and the learner's expectations for remembering. Because new situations and stimuli can prevent new memories from consolidating. Even if the learner were to attack the same information that he/she is trying so hard to remember, because by that point the memory has to reconsolidated, therefore is vulnerable.