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  • Sleep Well: Your Psychological Health Depends On It

    Sleep Well: Your Psychological Health Depends On It

     

    There is some truth to the phrase “waking up on the wrong side of the bed.” When I don’t sleep very well, I will probably be much more affected by seemingly minor mistakes than other times. For example, I might be particularly self-critical of a research presentation, ruminating on the negative aspects and failing to acknowledge anything positive. The recurrent thought of poorly answering a question might leave me feeling disappointed. In contrast, I will probably fail to retrieve the memories about the questions that were answered well or the clarity of concepts explained. Cognitive neuroscientists have linked poor sleep to poor psychological health at the neural level, particularly involving a brain structure called the amygdala.

    The amygdala is an almond-shaped brain structure that modulates emotional reactivity. When sleep deprived, amygdala function is perturbed and becomes over-reactive during the waking day (1). In other words, sleep deprivation can lead to a heightened sensitivity of the amygdala. For example, your roommate’s incessant pencil tapping that normally seems bearable when not sleep deprived, may be particularly annoying after a night of little to no sleep.

    Sleep deprivation may reduce attentional focus on positive materials.

    Moreover, sleep deprivation may influence emotional memory. For example, researchers gave participants a series of positive, negative, and neutral words to study. They found that those who were sleep deprived remembered fewer positive words than those who were well-rested (1). This suggests that sleep deprivation may reduce attentional focus on positive materials. Furthermore, it has also been found that connectivity between the amygdala and control center of the brain, the prefrontal cortex, is reduced when sleep deprived (2). Reduced feedback from the prefrontal cortex may lead to amygdala overactivity when sleep deprived.

    Sleeping through the night or over several nights gradually reduces one’s response to feel upset when recalling a negative experience.

    Considering that sleep deprivation impairs the ability to remember positive information, it is closely linked with depression. It is thought that obtaining sufficient sleep causes reductions in the emotional response to negative memories by reducing the response of the amygdala. In other words, sleeping through the night or over several nights gradually reduces one’s response to feel upset when recalling a negative experience. For example, after sleeping, you may be able to remember when your first pet passed away, or when you scored poorly on an exam, without feeling emotionally crippled by the memory. Sleep reduces emotional reactivity to memories.

    Experimental research found that sleep deprivation caused a near 30% increase in anxiety symptoms.

    In addition to an increased susceptibility to negative emotion, sleep deprivation is closely linked with anxiety. Indeed, recent experimental research found that sleep deprivation caused a near 30% increase in anxiety symptoms (3). For example, suddenly hearing a loud noise, such as an alarm, leads to fear as an initial reaction. You may feel your heart pound through your chest; your pupils may dilate; and you might look around to locate the noise. However, once you realize that it is only a test for the warning alarm systems, you will quickly resume to your work. However, if you’re sleep deprived, this process may happen a bit more slowly. It may take longer for your brain to process the fact that it’s only a warning alarm. Your increase in heart rate may persist, and you may feel anxious for longer than someone who is not sleep deprived. Thus, anxious feelings will likely be intensified when you are in a sleep-deprived state.

    Failing to sleep intensifies emotional responses at the neural level. Brain structures involved in emotional processing and cognitive control, particularly the amygdala and prefrontal cortex, are functionally altered by sleep deprivation. Although the life of a student is a demanding one, sleep should be prioritized in order to thrive and function with peak psychological health. So if you’re feeling crappy, try getting a good night’s sleep.

    References

    1.Walker, M. P., & van der Helm, E. (2009). Overnight therapy? The role of sleep in

    emotional brain processing. Psychological Bulletin, 135(5), 731–748.

    https://doi.org/10.1037/a0016570

    2.Yoo, S., Gujar, N., Hu, P., Jolesz, F. A., & Walker, M. P. (2007). The human emotional

    brain without sleep – a prefrontal-amygdala disconnect. Current Biology, 17(20), 1–8.

    https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2007.08.007

    3. Anwar, Yasmin. “Chronically anxious? Deep sleep may take the edge off.” Retrieved from: https://news.berkeley.edu/2018/11/06/chronically-anxious/

  • DUIs and Driving While Sleep Deprived: The Dangerous Similarities

    DUIs and Driving While Sleep Deprived: The Dangerous Similarities

    Life as a student can be frustratingly busy at times. In the most difficult periods, you have to complete multiple assignments simultaneously, all the while attempting to maintain a moderately healthy social life. You want to ace your tests, maintain your friendships, and visit your family regularly; maintaining balance among these goals is understandably difficult. When life becomes hectic, you may decide to vary from your typical routine, and one of the health behaviors that is often neglected is sleep.

    Sleep deprivation is a common problem in the US. At least a third of adults don’t obtain more than 7 hours of sleep each night, and this is detrimental to physical, psychological, and cognitive health (CDC, 2016; Watson et al., 2015). Total sleep deprivation, or failing to obtain any sleep in a given night (i.e., “all-nighters”), is common in student populations; students have reported pulling all-nighters more than twice per month (Hershner & Chervin, 2015). This may be especially common during exam times. For example, students sometimes pull all-nighters in preparation for tests. However, these behaviors have consequences at the behavioral and neural level.

    Sleep deprivation tends to increase activation in a control center of the brain, the prefrontal cortex, and this is thought to reflect increased effort to maintain cognitive control (Wilckens, Erickson, and Wheeler, 2012). For example, focusing attention and avoiding distractions may require more effort than when well-rested. Thus, studying all night could lead to undesirable consequences. Not only may students not retain crammed information over long time periods (e.g., weeks, years), but they may also experience dangerous psychomotor impairments (Durmer & Dinges, 2005).

    Researchers have found that driving while sleep deprived is statistically equivalent to driving with a blood alcohol content level of being legally intoxicated.

    Psychomotor impairments related to sleep deprivation directly affect driving ability. Researchers have found that driving while sleep deprived is similar to driving while under the influence. In fact, it is statistically equivalent to driving with a blood alcohol content level of being legally intoxicated. Those who drive while sleep deprived and those who drive while drunk have trouble maintaining their place on the road. They tend to accidentally cross into other lanes and look away from the road more often. Not surprisingly, the injury rate of motor crashes related to drowsy driving and drunk driving is similar.

    As students, we are often warned about the dangers of drunk driving and distracting driving (e.g., texting, talking on the phone), but there is little attention given to the dangers of driving while sleep deprived. The evidence is clear in regards to the importance of obtaining enough sleep for general health and cognitive function. However, if you must miss sleep, please refrain from driving. Instead, call a friend or call another ride. Just as you wouldn’t drive while under the influence, don’t drive while sleep deprived.

    References

    Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2016). 1 in 3 adults don’t get enough sleep. Atlanta, GA: US Department of Health and Human Services. Retrieved from https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2016/p0215-enough-sleep.html

    Durmer, J. S., & Dinges, D. F. (2005). Neurocognitive Consequences of Sleep Deprivation. Seminars in Neurology, 25, 1996. https://doi.org/10.1055/s-2005-867080

    Hershner, S. D. & Chervin, R. D. (2015). Causes and consequences of sleepiness among college students. Nature and Science of Sleep, 2014(6), 73–84.

    Watson, N. F., Badr, M. S., Belenky, G., Bliwise, D. L., Buxton, O. M., & Buysse, D. (2015). Joint consensus statement of the American Academy of sleep medicine and sleep research society on the recommended amount of sleep for a healthy adult: methodology and discussion. Sleep, 38(6), 591–592.

    Wilckens, K. A., Woo, S. G., Kirk, A. R., Erickson, K. I., & Wheeler, M. E. (2014). Role of sleep continuity and total sleep time in executive function across the adult lifespan. Psychology and Aging, 29(3), 658–665. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0037234

  • Crunchy Memes for Charged Fiends

    Crunchy Memes for Charged Fiends

  • Science Memes: Causing Trouble

    Science Memes: Causing Trouble

    When Max Planck began at the University of Munich studying Physics, he was told to pick another area of study as “in this field, almost everything is already discovered, and all that remains is to fill a few holes”. Nevertheless, Planck continued his studies, and went on to develop Quantum Theory, and was a pioneer into the world of modern physics.

  • Science Memes: Air Resistance

    Science Memes: Air Resistance

  • Science Memes: Duality of Light

    Science Memes: Duality of Light

  • God does not Play Dice

    God does not Play Dice

    “I am convinced God does not play dice with the universe.” – Albert Einstein

    Quantum Mechanics, despite how fancy and scifi-esque it sounds, is not a new concept. The “revolution” began in the beginning of the 1900s with Maxwell Planck’s theory that energy is quantized into “packets” called quanta, and has remained at the forefront of scientific discovery to the present day. The majority of the scientific community generally believes that Quantum Mechanics accurately describes the universe, but not everyone. In fact, Albert Einstein, himself, was not convinced of the completeness and accuracy of Quantum Theory. In fact, one of Einstein’s most famous quotations: “I am convinced God does not play dice with the universe.” was him expressing wariness of Quantum Theory, despite his work creating it. He was a champion of an idea that has become known as “Hidden Variable Theory”, an idea that persists to this day. But in order to learn what Hidden variable Theory actually is, we have to better understand what quantum mechanics is, and its difference from classical mechanics.

    You, as a person, have lots of experience dealing with Classical mechanics. Classical mechanics are the “laws of physics” that govern the world you are familiar with. Momentum, acceleration, orbits, forces, without meaning to, we come into contact with classical mechanics every day. Everything from the moon in the sky to the friction stopping your car from rear-ending the car in front of you, to a cornerback making the game-saving tackle at the end of the football game are governed by the laws of classical mechanics. And one important quality of classical mechanics is that it is deterministic. This means that that given all the information about a situation, you can predict what is going to happen. For example, we know, at any given moment, where the moon is in the sky. We know where the moon will be in the sky in 100 year from now because we understand the gravitational interaction between the earth and the moon, and based on the mass of both of the bodies, and their distance from each other, and the orbital speed, we know the path the moon will take for centuries to come. And it is incredible accurate too. At midnight (eastern standard time) on April 2, 3019 the moon will be 19.49% full.

    Quantum Mechanics, however, is not deterministic. Using quantum mechanics, we cannot predict the outcome of the situation with 100% accuracy. Instead, Quantum Mechanics is probabilistic. This means that we can determine the outcome that is most likely to occur, but we still do not know exactly what will happen. We just know the odds. (don’t tell Han). Quantum Mechanics govern the world of incredible small things. In systems nearly atomic in size, the laws of classical mechanics begin to break down, and a new, strange, law rules. And this law is very counter-intuitive, and because of this has faced a lot of backlash. Quantum Mechanics being probabilistic is the chief reason Einstein and other physicists have a problem with quantum mechanics, and is the motivation behind the Hidden Variable Theory.

    Imagine you are at a baseball game. Surrounded by fans and the smell of popcorn, you intently watch the pitcher throw pitch after pitch. Now imagine you had no idea what air was. The air is still there, of course, but in your mind, the pitcher’s hand is the only thing that affects the ball. The pitcher will pitch each ball exactly the same, but the ball will not always end up at the same place. Of course, most of the pitches would end up in the strike zone, but some won’t be. Some balls will curve, while others fly straight, some will be faster, slower, some will fly right down the middle and others will fly wayward. We cannot determine exactly where each pitch will end up, but we can say where it will most likely end up. This is probabilistic.

    Now imagine the same situation, but you are now aware of air. You understand how the spin of the ball interacts with the air to curve the ball, and aware how air currents and wind changes the path of the ball. With this new information, this new variable in the equation, we can now determine exactly where each pitch will end up. The discovery of this new variable turns the probabilistic system into a deterministic one. This is the main idea of Hidden Variable Theory, that Quantum Mechanics is incomplete, and some hidden variable, will make the it deterministic.

    Probabilistic systems are so foreign to us. The laws of physics we learned in high school and we have come in contact with are all deterministic, so it is only natural to think that if Quantum Mechanics is not deterministic, then it is only because we do not fully understand it. The search for this hidden variable persists to this day, albeit without success. Quantum Mechanics has proved to be very accurate when applied to a wide array of systems. The allure of this idea in understandable, after all, it makes sense, deterministic systems are familiar to us, and some of the brightest minds in history have dedicated years to finding this hidden variable. We do not know if God truly does play dice with the universe, but maybe the dice in its own way brings an elegance and beauty to the cosmos that would otherwise be so predictable.

    Genovese, M. (2007, January 12). Research on Hidden Variable Theories: A review of recent progresses. Retrieved March, 2019, from https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0701071

    Look Up the Moon Phase for Any Date. (n.d.). Retrieved March, 2019, from https://www.moonpage.com/index.html?go=T&auto_dst=T&tzone=et&m=4&d=2&y=3019&hour=0&min=0&sec=0Maguire, S. (2012, November 12).

    It’s been a tough week for hidden variable theories. Retrieved March, 2019, from https://quantumfrontiers.com/2012/11/08/its-been-a-tough-week-for-hidden-variable-theories/

    Townsend, J. S. (2012). A modern approach to quantum mechanics. Sausalito, CA: University Science Books.

    Uzer, A. T. (2018). Introduction to Quantum Mechanics. Lecture presented in Georgia Institute of Technology.