Professional Documents
Culture Documents
n
e
u
r1
2
0
1
Introducing sleep
After finishing this course, youll have a reasonable understanding
of some of the most famous motivated behaviors, sex and eating
being the two major ones.
As esteemed as these behaviors are, we spend a great deal more
time sleeping than we do engaging in either.
Most people sleep over 175,000 hours in their lifetimes.
This can vary a great deal between people, depending on their sleep
habits.
It can be quite depressing to think of how many hours wed save if
only we could sleep less.
Introducing sleep
The amount of hours per day an animal
spends sleeping has no clear relationship
with any aspect of its physiology or
anatomy.
Contrast this with things like food intake,
metabolic rate, water intake, etc., that
scale with the size of the animal.
NEUR%1201%%Fall%2013%%Harry%MacKay%
Stages of sleep
Early researchers studying the brain
during sleep made two interesting
discoveries.
1. The brain is quite active during sleep,
at certain times showing levels of
electrical activity that are equivalent to
being awake.
Stages of sleep
Using a machine called an
electroencephalogram (EEG), it is
possible to record the brains
electrical activity using electrodes
placed on the skull.
When a lot of neurons are firing
separately, one sees a low-amplitude,
high-frequency pattern of EEG
waves.
When neurons are firing in a
synchronous manner, the frequency
of the EEG wave goes down, but the
amplitude goes up.
NEUR%1201%%Fall%2013%%Harry%MacKay%
High
Low
Amplitude
Frequency (hz)
Stages of sleep
When the individual is awake and fully
alert, the EEG shows beta waves.
Beta waves are high-frequency, lowamplitude waves.
Illustration from Kolb & Wishaw, An Introduction to Brain and Behavior. Sinauer, 2014
Non-REM sleep
Non-REM sleep, also called deep sleep, is a
time during which a large range of activities
take place.
For example: body temperature decreases,
growth hormone secretion increases.
NEUR%1201%%Fall%2013%%Harry%MacKay%
People are free to move during nonREM sleep. This can lead to much
tossing and turning.
REM sleep
NEUR%1201%%Fall%2013%%Harry%MacKay%
Illustration from Kolb & Wishaw, An Introduction to Brain and Behavior. Sinauer, 2014
Illustration from Kolb & Wishaw, An Introduction to Brain and Behavior. Sinauer, 2014
Why do we dream?
The fact that we need to sleep is strange
enough, but the fact that we spend a
portion of the time vividly hallucinating,
only to experience amnesia about the
event upon waking up is especially
strange.
It is unlikely that dreams are essential to
mental functioning.
NEUR%1201%%Fall%2013%%Harry%MacKay%
During sleep, the brain does not receive much in the way
of sensory stimulation.
Sleep disorders
The disorders of sleep can broadly be
divided into dyssomnias and
parasomnias.
Dyssomnias involve diculties getting
enough sleep, problems with sleeping at
appropriate times, and reductions in the
quality of sleep.
E.g. narcolepsy, insomnia, hypersomnia
NEUR%1201%%Fall%2013%%Harry%MacKay%
Dyssomnia: Insomnia
Almost 33% of the population will report some symptoms
of insomnia during a given year.
Women report insomnia twice as often as men.
NEUR%1201%%Fall%2013%%Harry%MacKay%
Parasomnias
Parasomnias can occur during both REM and nonREM sleep, though each stage produces its own
symptoms.
Parasbomnias that occur during non-REM sleep
typically involve odd or unexpected movements.
Sleepwalking (sonambulism) is an example of this.
Nightmares occur during REM sleep.
Sleep paralysis is a phenomenon that can occur
during REM sleep.
During an attack of sleep paralysis, the individual partly
awakens, but remains paralyzed due to REM sleeps
suppression of muscle tone.
This is often accompanied by an overwhelming feeling of
dread, and the sense of the monstrous presence in the
room.
NEUR%1201%%Fall%2013%%Harry%MacKay%
NEUR%1201%%Fall%2013%%Harry%MacKay%
Interestingly, the same pattern of neurons that were activated by the
maze were also active during while the animal was asleep (during nonREM sleep).
This suggests that the animal was practicing the maze while asleep.
NEUR%1201%%Fall%2013%%Harry%MacKay%
Illustration from Kolb & Wishaw, An Introduction to Brain and Behavior. Sinauer, 2014
Nocturnal practice
Musicians have long known that a night of sleep
following a period of hard practice can work like
magic. Passages that the individual once struggled
with become much easier the next day.
The same appears to be true for athletes, and may
generalize to all forms of complicated motor learning.
Nocturnal practice
Before sleep!
B%
After sleep!
So why do we sleep?
Sleep is not a passive process, it is a period of
intense neural activity. The brain clearly invests a
lot of eort into sleeping.
While emerging evidence suggests that sleep is
important in consolidating memories and clearing
the brain of accumulated waste products, some
major questions remain to be answered.
Why do so many animals have such dierent
sleep patterns?