*** Welcome to piglix ***

Sleep-learning


Sleep-learning (also known as hypnopædia, or hypnopedia) is an attempt to convey information to a sleeping person, typically by playing a sound recording to them while they sleep. Research on this has been inconclusive. Some early studies tended to discredit the technique's effectiveness, while others have found that the brain indeed reacts to stimuli and processes them while we are asleep.

In 1927, Alois Benjamin Saliger invented the Psycho-Phone for sleep learning, stating that "It has been proven that natural sleep is identical with hypnotic sleep and that during natural sleep the unconscious mind is most receptive to suggestions."

Since the electroencephalography studies by Charles W. Simon and William H. Emmons in 1956, learning by sleep has not been taken seriously. The researchers concluded that learning during sleep was "impractical and probably impossible". They reported that stimulus material presented during sleep was not recalled later when the subject awoke unless alpha wave activity occurred at the same time the stimulus material was given. Since alpha activity during sleep indicates the subject is about to awake, the researchers felt that any learning occurred in a waking state.

In 2012, research from the Weizmann Institute of Science indicated that classical conditioning can occur during sleep by using odor recognition. "During sleep, humans can strengthen previously acquired memories, but whether they can acquire entirely new information remains unknown. The nonverbal nature of the olfactory sniff response, in which pleasant odors drive stronger sniffs and unpleasant odors drive weaker sniffs, allowed us to test learning in humans during sleep."

The idea of sleep-learning is found in influential science fiction and other literature. The following examples are listed chronologically by publication or original air date, when known.


...
Wikipedia

...