IF YOU are trying to commit something to memory, take a nap. Even a short daytime snooze could help you learn.
A good night’s sleep is known to improve people’s ability to learn actions such as mirror writing. REM sleep, when most dreaming occurs, is thought to be particularly important.
The role of sleep in factual learning has been less clear. Now Matthew Tucker at The City University of New York and his colleagues have shown that even a nap with no REM sleep can help.
Volunteers were told to memorise pairs of words (a test of factual learning) and…
