A study shows that sleep deprivation can negatively on the information

A study in Nov.1 issue of the journal Sleep shows that sleep deprivation, people with a more automatic, implicit process of categorizing information (information integration) will be the results of the transition process towards greater control explicit (rule-based). The use of rule-based strategies in a task in which the strategies of optimal integration of information exist for potentially disastrous errors made when a rapid and accurate categorization of fundamental importance for the question of survival. The results show that sleep deprivation for an overall deficit in information-integration category, the learning task, which took place over two days. Improved performance of the control group by 4.3 percent from the end of the first day, increased until the beginning of the second day (accurate to 74 per cent to 78.3 per cent), private services sleep in the group fell 2.4 per cent (accuracy declined 70.7 percent to 73.1 percent) from the end of the first day until the beginning of the second day.

According to the co-principal investigators W. Todd Maddox, PhD, professor of psychology, and David M. Schnyer, PhD, professor of psychology at the Institute of Neurosciences at the University of Texas at Austin, the rapid and accurate categorization is a critical situation could be an issue life or death. However, categorization is in people, the experience often suffer from lack of sleep in fast-paced, high rollers, such as doctors, firemen, soldiers and even parents. Many tasks need on a daily basis as information processing as a rule of integration based on categorization. The examples are driving, so that the medical diagnosis and implementation of air navigation.

Maddox and Schnyer were surprised that the source of information and lack of integration subset of sleep deprived people who are past strategies for integrating information when rested on the rule-based strategies of sleep deprivation . Lack of sleep participants, the information revealed strategies for integration in both races without loss of performance in the second session, mirroring the behavior of control participants.

"Some problems facing the current categorization is largely based on the explicit treatment of frontal brain systems. Processing in these systems is well known that sleep deprivation will be negatively affected. Categorization Other problems relate to not realize that the implicit treatment is largely based on learning the rules of procedure and the striatum "Maddox and Schnyer said in an e-mail." This study suggests that treatment of these systems is only slightly affected by sleep deprivation, sleep deprivation, however, performance may suffer as a result of many people doing when they express the implicit processes are required to leave. "

The study included 49 cadets from West Point on information categorization tasks of integrating twice by a period of 24 hours, with or without sleep between sessions of separate programs. Twenty-one cadets were assigned to a group of sleep deprivation (16 men, 5 women is 20.3 years old), while 28 were designated as controls (23 men, 5 women, average age 19.5 years). The group of sleep deprivation monitored to ensure they do not sleep, while the control group was allowed to maintain a normal sleep.

Tax and participants have been without sleep in two subgroups according to each individual data better days by sub-model information integration, or a rule-based split-adjustment model. 14 participants in the control group data were best fit by information and data-integration model of nine participants were better suited to a rule-based model. For the insomnia group 13 subscriber data "were best adapted for information and model data integration seven participants were better suited to a rule-based model.

The study cites previous research suggests that differences in the cortical white matter predict cognitive vulnerability to the effects of sleep deprivation. Based on previous studies conducted in their laboratories, the authors suggest that people are able to prevent the use of basic rules of categorization, when sleep, activated by a secondary task that the rule-based processes can be excluded.