Study: Share the bed with your spouse for quality sleep, super memory
By: Team Ifairer | Posted: 29-06-2020
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A new research has found that couples who slept together had enhanced and less disrupted rapid-eye movement (REM) sleep compared to when they slept individually. The REM sleep is associated with vivid dreams and has been linked to emotion regulation, memory consolidation, social interactions and creative problem solving. "Sleeping with a partner might actually give you an extra boost regarding your mental health, your memory and creative problem-solving skills," said Dr Henning Johannes Drews of the Center for Integrative Psychiatry (ZIP), Germany.
To date, most studies have compared co-sleep to individual sleep in couples by only measuring body movements. However Dr Drews and colleagues overcame these limitations by also assessing sleep architecture in couples that shared a bed.
They measured sleep parameters both in the presence and absence of the partner using dual simultaneous polysomnography, which is a "very exact, detailed and comprehensive method to capture sleep on many levels - from brain waves to movements, respiration, muscle tension, movements, heart activity". Additionally, the participants completed questionnaires designed to measure relationship characteristics (relationship duration, degree of passionate love and relationship depth, etc.)