It is important to remember the study does not suggest someone can learn new information while sleeping, Reber said. Though this concept was acknowledged, researchers didn’t know exactly why practice made perfect, he said, but this study’s results show the process can be influenced even while sleeping. The study results also help explain the previously accepted idea that practice helped improve a skill, said Paul Reber, an associate professor of psychology at Northwestern and co-author of the study. That’s why the new study is important, he said, because it emphasizes the participants’ ability to perform what they learned. In the musical sequences’ case, that would mean “you could know the sequence but not be able to play it,” Antony said. Previously in a Northwestern laboratory, subjects had participated in studies based on spatial memory, by placing objects on a screen in their proper locations. But this finding is new because it relates to perfecting a skill, rather than remembering learned information, he said. Similar research has been conducted in the past, said James Antony, the lead author of the study. The researchers concluded the participants’ exposure to musical cues played during their slow wave sleep stage helped them make fewer errors when re-tested. When they woke up, participants were re-tested and performed better on the sequence that had been played during their nap. The researchers purposely made the sequences difficult so practice would become important, and the subjects could potentially show improvement. The researchers monitored the participants’ brain activity, and when they entered the “slow wave sleep stage” - a period of deep sleep with occasional intervening periods of REM sleep - the psychologists played one of the two sequences quietly.īefore nap time, the participants performed equally on both sequences. Participants in the study, published June 26 in the scientific journal Nature Neuroscience, learned two different musical sequences on a computer screen while watching moving circles that went along with them, similar to video games such as Guitar Hero and Dance Dance Revolution.Īfter practicing for 25 minutes, the participants took a 90-minute nap. So, if you’re in the midst of an important decision, turn down the volume to a reasonable level.Northwestern University researchers are validating procrasti-nappers everywhere – they say a 90-minute nap can actually help in learning a new skill.Īt least when that skill is remembering a musical tune. Loud noise (over 95 decibels) can negatively affect our judgment. Overall, music has a positive effect on us, with one notable exception. The song is helping to bring back fond and pleasant memories. That’s why songs from the past can help you re-enact memories, and why many of us feel nostalgic when we hear songs from our childhood, adolescence or peak times in our life. Music also triggers the hippocampus, which is the part of your brain that’s associated with long-term memory storage. Engaging both sides of your brain simultaneously boosts your ability to solve problems because you’re using the creative left side of your brain at the same time as the logical right side. Listening to music activates both sides our brain, the left, and the right. The thing is that “pleasant” is a subjective term, and so the same song can affect each of us differently. For example, listening to pleasant tunes can boost serotonin levels, which makes us happy. On a physiological level, our breathing and heart rate will mirror the beat of a song.ĭifferent types of songs can also alter our body chemistry and hormone levels. And since our brain sends signals to every part of our body, music can affect us in a variety of ways. Our brains are wired to respond to music.