Spencer Rebecca M C
Department of Psychological & Brain Sciences, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, United States.
Adv Child Dev Behav. 2021;60:139-158. doi: 10.1016/bs.acdb.2020.08.004. Epub 2020 Sep 15.
While sleep, including naps, has been shown to benefit many cognitive functions in adults, understanding whether naps are beneficial in early childhood has important translational implications. Here we review recent studies which, collectively, suggest that naps indeed benefit cognition at this age. Specifically, declarative, motor, and emotional memory are better if a nap follows learning. Executive functions such as attention and emotion processing are likewise better following sleep. However, a better understanding of the mechanism supporting these benefits and the generalizability to other forms of learning and executive functions is necessary. It is important for future research to extend such findings, which may promote the use of naps to support early education, particularly for learning-impaired children.
虽然包括小睡在内的睡眠已被证明对成年人的许多认知功能有益，但了解小睡在幼儿期是否有益具有重要的转化意义。在此，我们综述了近期的研究，这些研究共同表明，小睡确实对这个年龄段的认知有益。具体而言，如果在学习后小睡，陈述性记忆、运动记忆和情绪记忆会更好。诸如注意力和情绪处理等执行功能在睡眠后同样会更好。然而，有必要更好地理解支持这些益处的机制以及对其他形式的学习和执行功能的可推广性。未来的研究扩展这些发现很重要，这可能会促进利用小睡来支持早期教育，特别是对于学习障碍儿童。
