Schnyer, D. V. (2009). Decision-Making Under Conditions of Sleep Deprivation: Cognitive and Neural Consequences. Military Psychology (Taylor & Francis Ltd), 2136-45.Journal
This study was designed to investigate how sleep deprivation affected the decision making with a sample of fifteen participants, four females and nine males. Previous studies, which focused on working memory, concluded in conflicting results; some labs have found that sleep deprivation slowed down cognitive processes whereas others have found decreased activity in the prefrontal cortex. In contrast, other labs have witnessed increased activation in a network of regions pertaining to working memory.
In this particular study, participants from the United States Military Academy at West Point and two graduate students from the University of Texas were asked to perform a series of tasks, before (day one) and after being kept awake for 24 hours (day two) to determine any change in neural activity regarding decision-making. To monitor neural activities …show more content…
However, both groups had increased hypothalamic and cerebellar activity in correlation with SCRs of late stimulus trials. This hints at a likelihood that sleep deprivation changes the fundamental sympathetic responsiveness to stimuli. The physiology and chemical processes of the brain were also affected. Fluctuating levels of cortisol shifted according to the participant’s sleep schedule and anticipation of sleep. Because cortisol has been linked to correlating strength of fear conditioning, these results support previous literature. On the other hand, there seemed to be a much less and insignificant change in associative learning processes that are controlled by the