Role du sommeil paradoxal dans l'apprentissage chez l'homme

The authors have tried to specify the role of paradoxical sleep (PS) in the learning process in man. For their study they used 12 medical students. Three polygraphic recordings of sleep were performed over 3 consecutive days. The night of the third day was preceded by the learning test (a series of 4 tests). A simulaneous study was carried out of the effects of learning on sleep and vice versa. This study does not show any significant increase in the total time of paradoxical sleep during the night which followed the learning. Only the second period of PS was increased. Thus, this research does not seem to confirm the results obtained in animals. But this disagreement may be explained by the limited number of subjects or by the contents of the tests used. On the other hand, the authors did obtain results which seem to confirm the favourable influence of sleep as a whole on the learning process.