PSYC 1030H Chapter Notes - Chapter 1: Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, Waking Life, Cirrhosis
Document Summary
When you first climb into bed and close your eyes, your brain emits bursts of alpha waves. Rem sleep: vivid dreams are most likely to occur here, occurs 70 90 minutes after falling asleep. Non-rem dreams tend to be shorter, less vivid, and more realistic. Rem and non-rem tend to alternate throughout the night. As the hours pass, stages 3 and 4 tend to shorten and disappear and rem periods tend to lengthen and occur closer together. The time between rem and non-rem is highly variable. Sleep appears to provide a time-out period, so that the body can eliminate waste products from muscles, repair cells, conserve or replenish energy stores, strengthen the immune system, or recover abilities lost during the day. Sleep is also necessary for normal mental functioning. Chronic sleep deprivation increases levels of the stress hormone cortisol, which may damage or impair brain cells that are necessary for learning and memory.