The Effect of Presleep Focal Attention Load on Subsequent Sleep Patterns

The hypothesis that a load on focal attention prior to sleep results in subsequent changes in sleep patterns was investigated. Eight females and 2 males slept in the laboratory for 4 nights: 2 adaptation nights, 1 experimental night preceded by a focal attention load, and 1 control night preceded by relaxed activity. On the experimental night, time in bed, total sleep time, and stage REM sleep were significantly longer than on the control night. The results support the hypothesis and suggest that attention during REM sleep has a unique character.     

Myoclonic attacks induced by L-Dopa and Bromocryptin in Parkinson patients

Summary Six patients with Parkinson's disease developed nocturnal myoclonic attacks after prolongued treatment with L-Dopa which were electroencephalographically recorded. These symptoms persisted after treatment with 2 bromo-alpha-ergocryptin (Bromocryptin), a dopamine receptor agonist, which was substituted for L-Dopa. Bromocryptin is known to have no pre- or postsynaptic effect on serotonin metabolism. It is proposed that these myoclonic phenomena are the expression of the hypersensitivity of denervated catecholamine receptors in the brainstem to the stimulation of L-Dopa and Bromocryptin. This thesis differs with previous suggestions that serotonin plays a major role in the genesis of myoclonic seizures in Parkinsonian patients treated with L-Dopa.

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Zusammenfassung Bei 6 Patienten mit Parkinsonscher Krankheit, die über längere Zeit mit L-Dopa behandelt wurden, entwickelten sich Anfälle von nächtlichen Myoklonien, die elektroenzephalographisch registriert wurden. Diese Symptome waren weiterhin nachweisbar, auch nachdem die L-Dopa-Behandlung durch eine Behandlung mit 2 Bromo-Alpha-Ergocryptin (Bromocryptin) ersetzt wurde, ein Dopamin-Rezeptoren-Antagonist. Es ist bekannt, daß Bromocryptin weder prä- noch postsynaptisch einen Effekt auf den Serotoninstoffwechsel hat. Es wird vermutet, daß diese myoklonischen Erscheinungen Ausdruck einer Überempfindlichkeit der denervierten Katecholaminrezeptoren im Hirnstamm sind, die vermehrt auf die Stimulation durch L-Dopa und Bromocryptin ansprechen. Diese Annahme weicht von früheren Erklärungsversuchen ab, wonach das Serotonin eine bedeutsame Rolle in der Genese der myoklonischen Anfälle bei mit L-Dopa behandelten Parkinsonkranken spielen soll.

     

Acute and repeated gestational stress affect offspring learning and activity in rats

This study assessed possible long-lasting effects of mild, indirect prenatal stress upon offspring. Dams were restrained for 30 minutes either once or four times during the third trimester of gestation. Their male offspring were challenged in adulthood with a series of appetitive operant learning tasks. Both acute and repeated prenatal maternal restraint retarded the performance of the offspring in a selective manner: deficits appeared during the reversal stage of an operant discrimination task, with no effect on acquisition, discrimination or extinction. Repeated, but not acute, maternal stress was also associated with offspring hyperactivity. This highlights the differential impact of varying the stress schedule. Furthermore, use of multiple measures of learning uncovered a long-lasting, selective effect of relatively mild, indirect prenatal manipulation.     

Sleep of chronic post-traumatic patients

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the sleep of people diagnosed as suffering from chronic Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). The sleep of seven chronic post-traumatic patients with no known physical injuries was compared with that of seven matched control subjects. The post-traumatic patients had poorer sleep: decreased sleep efficiency, increase in number of awakenings, and decreased SWS, as well as longer REM latency. It was also found that their complaints correlated with relevant sleep-monitored measures. The findings add further support for the inclusion of sleep difficulties in the definition of the Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.     

CHILDREN''S PERCEPTION OF DEATH IN HUMANS AND ANIMALS AS A FUNCTION OF AGE, ANXIETY AND COGNITIVE ABILITY

This study investigated the impact of age, cognitive level and anxiety level on children's conception of death in humans and animals. Children from three age groups (6-7; 8-9; 10-11) were divided into high and low anxiety levels and high and low cognitive abilities. Then, the children were administered two questionnaires on human and animal death. The findings show that there was a main effect of age, anxiety and cognition on the conception of both animal and human death. Human death scores were higher than animal death scores. The interactions indicate that anxiety has a stronger impact on cognitively high subjects than on cognitively low subjects and that cognition affects the animal death concept more than the human death concept.     

EEG sleep patterns in Parkinsonian patients treated with Bromocryptine and L-Dopa: A comparative study

Summary The nocturnal sleep patterns of six Parkinsonian patients treated with Bromocryptine (2-Br-L-ergocryptine CB-154), a dopamine-like agonist, were compared with those of the same patients under L-DOPA treatment. No significant differences were found between the two groups.It is suggested that Bromocryptine, acting on dopamine receptors in the sleep regulating systems at the reticular level in the midbrain has the same effect on sleep patterns of Parkinsonian patients as L-DOPA.     

The Effect of REM Deprivation: Is It Detrimental,Beneficial, or Neutral?

Based on the assumption that the mental aspect of REM sleep is an extreme state of divergent thinking, it was hypothesized that the psychological effect of REM deprivation varies on a dimension of creativity versus rote learning. On the creativity pole, REM deprivation has a damaging effect, while on the rote learning pole, it has a beneficial effect. The subjects (.Ss) were 12 male undergraduate students. Each spent 3 nights in the laboratory. Ss served us their own controls, with 5 days separating the REM deprivation and the non-REM deprivation nights. Before going to bed, each of the Ss was given 4 tasks, on which testing took place the fallowing morning. Comparable tasks, in a balanced design, were used on the REM deprivation and on the non-REM deprivation nights, The tasks given were: (a) serial memory, (b) “clustering” memory, (c) word fluency, and (d) Guilford's Utility Test. Results showed a significant decrement in creativity (the Guilford's Utility Test), and a significant increment in role memory (the serial memory task), due to REM deprivation. No significant differences were found for the other 2 tasks used, which were somewhere in-between the two extreme poles of creativity and role learning. These results might explain earlier, contradictory findings in this area. These results lend further support to the general assumption that REM sleep is used by the organism for internal information processing. However, an additional assumption has to be. made, that this processing is divergent and not convergent.     

REM Deprivation and Divergent Thinking

The contribution of REM sleep to divergent thinking was examined. Ten subjects were deprived of REM sleep and of equal length of NREM sleep. In both cases a divergent thinking task was assigned in the evening to be performed in the morning. The subjects' responses after NREM deprivation were numerically greater, included more positive reactions, and were more divergent and original than those produced after REM deprivation. The study thus reconfirms the hypothesis that REM sleep contributes to divergent thinking and supports the claim that it encourages the individual's adaptation to new situations.