New York: A recent study including psychology researchers from Binghamton University, State University of New York investigates how poor sleep alters brain communication across the adult lifespan, specifically examining how these changes vary by age and biological sex.
The article appeared in a recent edition of the journal Neurobiology of Aging. The researchers analyzed brain scans from two large groups totaling more than 1,300 participants to see how brain networks connect at rest in people who report having poor sleep quality.
“We discovered that the poorly slept older brain looks like it is suffering from a general breakdown in its sleep-regulation systems,” Associate Professor of Psychology, Ian McDonough, said.
College-age adults with poor sleep quality exhibited overconnected brain regions involved in movement, suggesting that their bodies aren’t physically ready to sleep. In older adults, typically age 65 and above, these same regions were under-connected; instead, they showed hyperconnectivity in brain regions involved in cognition.
In particular, older women with poor sleep showed abnormal hyperconnectivity between the Default Mode Network (DMN), which is involved in internal thoughts and memory, and the Frontal Parietal Network (FPN), which is involved in sustained attention and working memory. This over-communication pattern was directly linked to poorer memory performance and mirrors brain wiring patterns seen in the preclinical, silent stages of Alzheimer’s disease, McDonough said.
“One strong possibility is that people who have a lot of running thoughts right before bed are not in a calm state, but rather more of an agitated state,” McDonough said.
