Sleep-dependent Consolidation Enhances Naturalistic Episodic Memory Recall

Compared to wakefulness, sleep can enhance episodic memory through consolidation. Yet, sleep may not boost all aspects of memory given that it has been shown to favour memory for spatiotemporal over item details. Previous work has tested memory for lab-based stimuli in one experimental session, making it unclear whether these findings generalize to memory for real-life events over a longer period of time. To address this question, we assessed participants’ memory after they experienced the same staged event with online recognition memory tests across four timepoints. Participants made true/ false judgments about the items and sequences they encountered during the event, allowing us to dissociate between these two memory measures. These data suggest that sleep, relative to wakefulness, confers a widespread – but short-lived –mnemonic advantage since both elements of episodic memory were equally retained. This investigation yields insights into the mnemonic benefit of sleep-dependent consolidation for our real-world experiences.M.A.2021-11-26 00:00:0