To learn better, take a nap — and don’t forget to dream, says a new study.
Researchers at Harvard University have found people who take a nap and dream about a task they’ve just learned perform it better upon waking than either those who don’t sleep at all or those who sleep but don’t dream.
The subjects in the study were asked to sit in front of a computer screen and learn the layout of a three-dimensional maze so that they could find their way to a landmark (a tree) when they were plopped down at a random location within the virtual space five hours later.
Those who were allowed to take a nap and also remembered dreaming of the task found the tree in less time.
“We at first thought that dreaming must reflect the memory process that’s improving performance. But when you look at the content of the dreams, it was hard to argue that,” said lead researcher Robert Stickgold.
In a couple of cases, the dreamers said they recalled just the music from the computer maze. One subject said they were dreaming that there were people at particular checkpoints in the maze, even though the real maze didn’t have any people or checkpoints.
“We think that the dreams are a marker that the brain is working on the same problem at many levels. The dreams might reflect the brain’s attempt to find associations for the memories that could make them more useful in the future,” Stickgold said.
In other words, it’s not that the dreams led to better memory, but rather that they are a sign that other, unconscious parts of the brain were working hard to remember how to get through the virtual maze, say the researchers.
Stickgold said that there may still be ways to take advantage of this phenomenon for improving learning and memory. For instance, it may be better to study hard right before you go to sleep than in the afternoon, or to take a nap after a period of intense afternoon study.
“Some have viewed dreaming as entertainment, but this study suggests it is a byproduct of memory processing. After all, he said, people generally remember only a small fraction, no more than 10 to 15 per cent, of their dreams,” he said.
The findings have been published in the latest edition of the ‘Current Biology’ journal.
