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  • Perspective
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Optimizing the methodology of human sleep and memory research

Nature Reviews Psychology volume 3, pages 123–137 (2024)Cite this article

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Abstract

Understanding the complex relationship between sleep and memory consolidation is a major challenge in cognitive neuroscience and psychology. Many studies suggest that sleep triggers off-line memory processes, resulting in less forgetting of declarative memory and performance stabilization in non-declarative memory. However, the role of sleep in human memory consolidation is still under considerable debate, and numerous contradictory and non-replicable findings have been reported. Methodological issues related to experimental designs, task characteristics and measurements, and data-analysis practices all influence the effects that are observed and their interpretation. In this Perspective, we review methodological issues in sleep and memory studies and suggest constructive solutions to address them. We believe that implementing these solutions in future sleep and memory research will substantially advance the field and improve understanding of the specific role of sleep in memory consolidation.

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Fig. 1: Experimental conditions for sleep and memory studies.
Fig. 2: Full design for testing pathology or interventions.
Fig. 3: Designs to address the effect of fatigue.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank K. Schipper for her help and comments on the manuscript. This research was supported by the ANR grant awarded within the framework of the Inserm CPJ ANR-22-CPJ1-0042-01 (to D.N.); Hungary’s National Brain Research Program (project NAP2022-I-2/2022); NKFIH-OTKA PD 124148 (Principal Investigator K.J.); NKFI FK 142945 (Principal Investigator P.S.); Janos Bolyai Research Fellowship of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (to K.J. and P.S.); and the French National Agency for Research (ANR, grant number ANR-15-CE33-0003, Principal Investigator S.M.).

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Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Dezső Németh, Emilie Gerbier, Karolina Janacsek.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre de Recherche en Neurosciences de Lyon CRNL U1028 UMR5292, INSERM, CNRS, Université Claude Bernard Lyon, Bron, France

    Dezső Németh, Perrine Ruby & Teodóra Vékony

  2. Institute of Psychology, ELTE Eötvös Lorand University, Budapest, Hungary

    Dezső Németh, Peter Simor & Karolina Janacsek

  3. Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Hun-Ren Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Budapest, Hungary

    Dezső Németh

  4. Laboratoire Bases, Corpus, Langage (UMR 7320), CNRS, Université Côte d’Azur, Nice, France

    Emilie Gerbier

  5. Institute of Medical Psychology and Behavioral Neurobiology, University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany

    Jan Born & Susanne Diekelmann

  6. Department of Psychology, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA, USA

    Timothy Rickard

  7. Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Hospital Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany

    Susanne Diekelmann

  8. School of Psychology, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada

    Stuart Fogel

  9. Donders Institute for Brain Cognition and Behaviour, Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands

    Lisa Genzel

  10. Institute for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Center for Integrative Psychiatry, University Hospital Schleswig-Holstein, Kiel, Germany

    Alexander Prehn-Kristensen

  11. Department of Psychology, Faculty of Human Sciences, MSH Medical School Hamburg, University of Applied Sciences and Medical University, Hamburg, Germany

    Alexander Prehn-Kristensen

  12. Department of Psychology, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN, USA

    Jessica Payne

  13. Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

    Martin Dresler

  14. Institute of Behavioural Sciences, Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary

    Peter Simor

  15. Forgetting Team, Centre de Recherche en Neurosciences de Lyon CRNL U1028 UMR5292, INSERM, CNRS, Université Claude Bernard Lyon, Bron, France

    Stephanie Mazza

  16. Department of Psychology, Centre for Cognitive Neuroscience, University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria

    Kerstin Hoedlmoser & Manuel Schabus

  17. Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, USA

    Rebecca M. C. Spencer

  18. Department of Movement Sciences, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

    Genevieve Albouy

  19. Centre for Thinking and Learning, Institute for Lifecourse Development, School of Human Sciences, University of Greenwich, London, UK

    Karolina Janacsek

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  1. Dezső Németh
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Contributions

D.N., E.G., J.B., T.R., S.D., S.F., L.G., A.P.-K., J.P., M.D., P.S., S.M., K.H., P.R., R.M.C.S., G.A., T.V., M.S. and K.J. contributed substantially to discussion of the content. All authors wrote the article. All authors reviewed and/or edited the manuscript before submission.

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Correspondence to Dezső Németh.

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Németh, D., Gerbier, E., Born, J. et al. Optimizing the methodology of human sleep and memory research. Nat Rev Psychol 3, 123–137 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44159-023-00262-0

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