Retention of Verbal Materials Perceived Immediately Prior to Onset of Non-Rem Sleep

Abstract

During the night Ss were awakened a number of times and shown verbal learning materials. Latency of subsequent onset of non-REM sleep was experimentally manipulated. In the morning, retention for the materials perceived was tested. Retention for words perceived immediately prior to sleep onset was significantly worse than for those followed by a period of enforced wakefulness. This finding suggests that non-REM sleep may impede the consolidation of memory traces.