The Detection of Sleep Onset: Behavioral and Physiological Convergence

Abstract

ABSTRACT Reaction time (RT), a behavioral measure of arousal, was used to examine standard criteria (Rechtschaffen & Kales, 1968) for assessing sleep onset (SO) and the sensitivity of changes in respiratory patterns at SO. Following 24 hrs without sleep, RT, respiratory, and EEG measures were used to study SO in 12 subjects. Sleep deprivation (SD) permitted multiple examinations of SO in 2 daytime testing periods. Strong relationships between RT and EEG‐based measures of SO serve to confirm the distinction between wakefulness and stage 1 sleep, and moderate to weak correlations between RT and respiratory indices describe the usefulness of the latter. Behavioral, respiratory and EEG assessments of the shift from wakefulness to sleep were observed to be orderly and rapid in these SD volunteers, suggesting that the detection of SO could be sharpened by adding behavioral and respiratory measures to the usual EEG criteria. The close temporal correspondence among these changes has interesting implications for sleep/waking mechanisms.