Open AccessSleep and Second-Language Acquisition Revisited: The Role of Sleep Spindles and Rapid Eye Movements
Author(s) -
Kristen Thompson,
Aaron Gibbings,
James Shaw,
L. Bryan Ray,
Gilles Hébert,
Joseph De Koninck,
Stuart Fogel
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
nature and science of sleep
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.715
H-Index - 34
ISSN - 1179-1608
DOI - 10.2147/nss.s326151
Subject(s) - medicine , sleep (system call) , sleep spindle , eye movement , non rapid eye movement sleep , rapid eye movement sleep , audiology , neuroscience , ophthalmology , psychology , computer science , operating system
Second-language learning (SLL) depends on distinct functional-neuroanatomical systems including procedural and declarative long-term memory. Characteristic features of rapid eye movement (REM) and non-REM sleep such as rapid eye movements and sleep spindles are electrophysiological markers of cognitively complex procedural and declarative memory consolidation, respectively. In adults, grammatical learning depends at first on declarative memory ("early SLL") then shifts to procedural memory with experience ("late SLL"). However, it is unknown if the shift from declarative to procedural memory in early vs late SLL is supported by sleep. Here, we hypothesized that increases in sleep spindle characteristics would be associated with early SLL, whereas increases in REM activity (eg, density and EEG theta-band activity time-locked to rapid eye movements) would be associated with late SLL.