The Fate of Emotional Memories Over a Week: Does Sleep Play Any Role?
Although there is a wide consensus on how sleep processes declarative memories, how sleep affects emotional memories remains elusive. Moreover, studies assessing the long-term effect of sleep on emotional memory consolidation are scarce. Studies testing subclinical populations characterized by REM a...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2019-03-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Psychology |
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| Online Access: | https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00481/full |
| _version_ | 1817988293034246144 |
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| author | Nicola Cellini Marco Mercurio Michela Sarlo Michela Sarlo |
| author_facet | Nicola Cellini Marco Mercurio Michela Sarlo Michela Sarlo |
| author_sort | Nicola Cellini |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Although there is a wide consensus on how sleep processes declarative memories, how sleep affects emotional memories remains elusive. Moreover, studies assessing the long-term effect of sleep on emotional memory consolidation are scarce. Studies testing subclinical populations characterized by REM abnormalities are also lacking. Here we aimed to (i) investigate the fate of emotional memories and the potential unbinding (or preservation) between content and affective tone over time (i.e., 1 week), (ii) explore the role of seven nights of sleep (recorded via actigraphy) in emotional memory consolidation, and (iii) assess whether participants with self-reported mild-moderate depressive symptoms forget less emotional information compared to participants with low depression symptoms. We found that, although at the immediate recognition session emotional information was forgotten more than neutral information, a week later it was forgotten less than neutral information. This effect was observed both in participants with low and mild-moderate depressive symptoms. We also observed an increase in valence rating over time for negative pictures, whereas perceived arousal diminished a week later for both types of stimuli (unpleasant and neutral); an initial decrease was already observable at the immediate recognition session. Interestingly, we observed a negative association between sleep efficiency across the week and change in memory discrimination for unpleasant pictures over time, i.e., participants who slept worse were the ones who forgot less emotional information. Our results suggest that emotional memories are resistant to forgetting, particularly when sleep is disrupted, and they are not affected by non-clinical depression symptomatology. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-14T00:32:36Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-c538245defb04353bd14fc522a53f004 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1664-1078 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-14T00:32:36Z |
| publishDate | 2019-03-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Psychology |
| spelling | doaj.art-c538245defb04353bd14fc522a53f0042022-12-22T02:22:30ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Psychology1664-10782019-03-011010.3389/fpsyg.2019.00481430453The Fate of Emotional Memories Over a Week: Does Sleep Play Any Role?Nicola Cellini0Marco Mercurio1Michela Sarlo2Michela Sarlo3Department of General Psychology, University of Padua, Padua, ItalyDepartment of General Psychology, University of Padua, Padua, ItalyDepartment of General Psychology, University of Padua, Padua, ItalyNeuroscience Center, University of Padua, Padua, ItalyAlthough there is a wide consensus on how sleep processes declarative memories, how sleep affects emotional memories remains elusive. Moreover, studies assessing the long-term effect of sleep on emotional memory consolidation are scarce. Studies testing subclinical populations characterized by REM abnormalities are also lacking. Here we aimed to (i) investigate the fate of emotional memories and the potential unbinding (or preservation) between content and affective tone over time (i.e., 1 week), (ii) explore the role of seven nights of sleep (recorded via actigraphy) in emotional memory consolidation, and (iii) assess whether participants with self-reported mild-moderate depressive symptoms forget less emotional information compared to participants with low depression symptoms. We found that, although at the immediate recognition session emotional information was forgotten more than neutral information, a week later it was forgotten less than neutral information. This effect was observed both in participants with low and mild-moderate depressive symptoms. We also observed an increase in valence rating over time for negative pictures, whereas perceived arousal diminished a week later for both types of stimuli (unpleasant and neutral); an initial decrease was already observable at the immediate recognition session. Interestingly, we observed a negative association between sleep efficiency across the week and change in memory discrimination for unpleasant pictures over time, i.e., participants who slept worse were the ones who forgot less emotional information. Our results suggest that emotional memories are resistant to forgetting, particularly when sleep is disrupted, and they are not affected by non-clinical depression symptomatology.https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00481/fullactigraphyarousalemotional memorysleepvalencetime |
| spellingShingle | Nicola Cellini Marco Mercurio Michela Sarlo Michela Sarlo The Fate of Emotional Memories Over a Week: Does Sleep Play Any Role? Frontiers in Psychology actigraphy arousal emotional memory sleep valence time |
| title | The Fate of Emotional Memories Over a Week: Does Sleep Play Any Role? |
| title_full | The Fate of Emotional Memories Over a Week: Does Sleep Play Any Role? |
| title_fullStr | The Fate of Emotional Memories Over a Week: Does Sleep Play Any Role? |
| title_full_unstemmed | The Fate of Emotional Memories Over a Week: Does Sleep Play Any Role? |
| title_short | The Fate of Emotional Memories Over a Week: Does Sleep Play Any Role? |
| title_sort | fate of emotional memories over a week does sleep play any role |
| topic | actigraphy arousal emotional memory sleep valence time |
| url | https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00481/full |
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