Question

Do power naps have the same effect on memorizing as normal sleep?

Answer 1

Short  no one knows. My instinct is that power naps are probably more or less useless because the protein synthesis component of consolidation (I think?) would take longer than that….don’t quote me, though. What exam are you cramming for? Long  “The time spent in REM sleep is not correlated with learning ability across humans, nor is there a positive relation between REM sleep time or intensity and encephalization across species. Although sleep is clearly important for optimum acquisition and performance of learned tasks, a major role in memory consolidation is unproven.” http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/294/5544/1058 “Using a motor skill finger-tapping task, here we provide evidence for at least three different stages of human motor memory processing after initial acquisition. We describe the unique contributions of wake and sleep in the development of different forms of consolidation, and show that waking reactivation can turn a previously consolidated memory back into a labile state requiring subsequent reconsolidation.” http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=15202347 ”...each stage of sleep seems to contribute differently to these processes….” http://leitl.org/docs/public_html/striz/striz.org/docs/05sleep-memory.pdf