Correlations between adolescent processing speed and specific spindle frequencies

Sleep spindles are waxing and waning thalamocortical oscillations with accepted frequencies of between 11 and 16 Hz and a minimum duration of 0.5 s. Our research has suggested that there is spindle activity in all of the sleep stages, and thus for the present analysis we examined the link between sp...

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Published inFrontiers in human neuroscience Vol. 9; p. 30
Main Authors Nader, Rebecca S, Smith, Carlyle T
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Switzerland Frontiers Research Foundation 09.02.2015
Frontiers Media S.A
Subjects
Activity patterns
Adolescents
Age
Automation
Brain research
Cerebral cortex
Child development
Cognitive ability
EEG
Eye movements
Health care
Intelligence
Neuroscience
Oscillations
processing speed
rem
REM sleep
Researchers
Sleep
spindles
SWS
Thalamus
Canada
sleep
spindles
stage 2
REM
SWS
intelligence
processing speed
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Summary:Sleep spindles are waxing and waning thalamocortical oscillations with accepted frequencies of between 11 and 16 Hz and a minimum duration of 0.5 s. Our research has suggested that there is spindle activity in all of the sleep stages, and thus for the present analysis we examined the link between spindle activity (Stage 2, rapid eye movement (REM) and slow wave sleep (SWS)) and waking cognitive abilities in 32 healthy adolescents. After software was used to filter frequencies outside the desired range, slow spindles (11.00-13.50 Hz), fast spindles (13.51-16.00 Hz) and spindle-like activity (16.01-18.50 Hz) were observed in Stage 2, SWS and REM sleep. Our analysis suggests that these specific EEG frequencies were significantly related to processing speed, which is one of the subscales of the intelligence score, in adolescents. The relationship was prominent in SWS and REM sleep. Further, the spindle-like activity (16.01-18.50 Hz) that occurred during SWS was strongly related to processing speed. Results suggest that the ability of adolescents to respond to tasks in an accurate, efficient and timely manner is related to their sleep quality. These findings support earlier research reporting relationships between learning, learning potential and sleep spindle activity in adults and adolescents.
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Reviewed by: Steffen Gais, University of Munich, Germany; Erin J. Wamsley, Furman University, USA
This article was submitted to the journal Frontiers in Human Neuroscience.
Edited by: Tore Nielsen, Université de Montréal, Canada
ISSN:1662-5161
1662-5161
DOI:10.3389/fnhum.2015.00030