By Denise Mann, Health.com
小睡增強記憶，先決條件是你得有夢才行
STORY HIGHLIGHTS 故事重點
· An afternoon power nap may boost ability to process and store information, study suggests
研究建議午後優質小睡可以增強處理和儲存資訊的能力
· During dreams, the brain looks at connections that you might not think of or notice when awake
在夢境時，腦袋審視當你清醒時不會想到或注意到的連結
· Nappers did better than the students who had stayed awake in a maze test
小睡者比保持清醒的學生，在迷宮測試裡表現更好
Sleep has long been known to improve performance on memory tests. Now, a new study suggests that an afternoon power nap may boost your ability to process and store information tenfold -- but only if you dream while you're asleep.
"When you dream, your brain is trying to look at connections that you might not think of or notice when [you're] awake," says the lead author of the study, Robert Stickgold, the director of the Center for Sleep and Cognition at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, in Boston, Massachusetts. "In the dream...the brain tries to figure out what's important and what it should keep or dump because it's of no value."
睡眠長久以來以廣為所知能增進記憶類考試的成積。而現在，新的研究建議午後優質小睡能增強你處理及儲存資訊的能力十倍之多—但是先決條件是當你睡著時得有做夢才行。 “當你做夢時，你的腦部正試著檢視著當你醒時不會想到或注意到的連結”—該研究主筆，羅伯特．史蒂高說道。 “在夢境裡...人腦會試著理解出什麼是重要和什麼需要保留或因為沒有價值應當拋棄。”
In the study, Stickgold and his colleagues asked 99 college students to memorize a complex maze on a computer. The researchers then placed the students inside a virtual, 3-D version of the maze and asked them to navigate to another spot within it. After doing this several times, half of the participants took a 90-minute nap while the other half stayed awake and watched videos.
在該研究中，共要求參與的99位大學學生記下電腦裡顯示的一個複雜的迷宮。研究人員將學生置於一個虛擬的三度空間的迷宮中，並要求他們導引至迷宮中的其它地點。如此進行了幾次後，當其它半數保持清醒和觀看影片的同時，剩下的半數參與者小睡了90分鐘。
When the students were given the maze test again five hours later, the nappers did better than the students who had stayed awake, even those who had reviewed the maze in their heads. However, the nappers who dreamed about the maze -- one described being lost in a bat cave -- performed 10 times better than the nappers who didn't.
當所有學生在五小時後再次接受迷宮測試，小睡過的人表現得比保持清醒的人還好，即便這些人員之前已回顧他們腦海裡的迷宮。而且，有做過關於迷宮夢境的小睡人員(其中有描述迷失在蝙蝠洞裡)，表現十倍好於未做夢者。
The students who dreamed about the maze did poorly on the test the first time around -- which may not be a coincidence, the researchers say. If a task is difficult for you, your brain seems to know it, and you may be more likely to dream about it than if the task were easier.
做過關於迷宮夢境的學生在受測的第一輪表現不佳，這可能不是巧合，研究人員表示。假如此關卡是困難地，你的腦似乎會知道，並且比起簡單的關卡，你更可能會去夢到它。
"If you're not good at something, and you dream about it, you seem to get better at it -- especially if the information can be used in different situations," says Michael Breus, the clinical director of the sleep division for Arrowhead Health, in Glendale, Arizona, who was not involved in the study.
“假如你不善於某事，而你做了相關的夢，你似乎就會有較好的表現—特別是假如此資訊可以應用在不同的情況下”，麥可．布魯斯說道，睡眠部門的臨床主任，並未參與該研究。
"The sleeping brain seems to be processing information on one level, but on a higher level it helps evolve your memory network if the information is relevant or helpful in your life experience," adds Breus, who is also the author of "Beauty Sleep."
“睡眠中的腦似乎在一個層次中處理資訊，但是在較高的層次中，假如此資訊是相關的或對你的生活經驗有助益，此方式會有助於關連你的記憶網絡。”布魯斯補充道，他同樣是美容覺的作者。
The study's findings, which appear in the journal Current Biology, underscore just how important sleep is to our memory and mental function.
此研究的發現，發表於 Current Biology 當代生物學期刊中，強調睡眠對於記憶和智力作用是如此地重要
It doesn't even need to be a deep sleep, as the researchers found when they monitored the brain activity of the students while they slept. Although the deep slumber known as rapid eye movement (REM) is most closely associated with dreaming, the students' dreaming and learning occurred after as little as one minute of non-REM sleep.
當研究人員監測學生們做夢時的腦部活動，發現此作用甚至不需要深睡。儘管深睡被認為是跟做夢有關的快速眼球運動，學生做夢和學習就發生在無快速眼球運動的睡眠一分鐘稍後。
The type of learning that occurs while you dream can be illustrated by the classic dream that many people have in which they show up for an exam that they haven't studied for, Stickgold says.
這樣的學習形態發生在做夢時，可以經由許多人都有過的典型的夢境來解釋，例如夢到他們並未準備的考試，史蒂高說道。
"When you're in school -- especially college -- there's this ongoing sense that you haven't done enough," he says. "Maybe you didn't make it to a lecture, or you had a paper due in three days that you hadn't started, so you're laying down memories that say, 'I haven't done anything that I need to do.'"
“當你在學校時--尤其是大學—會持續有一種你總是做得不夠意識”--他說道， “或許是你沒準備好上台，或者作業三天後要交了，你卻還沒開工，因此你開始地產生如此的記憶如 “我還沒完成任何我該做的事。”
When someone has the exam dream (or nightmare), he says, "Your brain is taking the knowledge of what happened to help you behave differently in the future."
當某人做了考試的夢(或惡夢)，他說道 “你的腦海是正在汲取發生中的知識來幫助你在未有不同的好表現。”
You may be able to harness the dream power displayed in the study to perform better in your everyday life, Breus says.
或許你能夠去駕馭此研究中展示的夢的力量，去運用在日常生活中表現地更好，布魯斯說道。
