Immediate and long-lasting cognitive consequences of adolescent chronic sleep restriction.

Abstract

The present study investigated immediate and long-lasting cognitive effects of chronic sleep restriction (CSR) in adolescent rats. After 10 days of CSR produced by gentle handling, both hippocampal-dependent and non-hippocampal-dependent long-term memory abilities were tested using the object location task and the object recognition task, respectively. Testing occurred in adolescence and after a 4-week delay during which rats slept freely and matured to adulthood. Rats exposed to CSR showed impaired memory on the object location task during adolescence that persisted into adulthood. However, there was no effect of CSR on memory for the object recognition task at either time point. These results demonstrate that CSR during adolescence produces an impairment in hippocampal-dependent memory but does not affect non-hippocampal-dependent memory. In addition, this impairment persists even after 4 weeks of undisturbed sleep. This study is the first rodent model to use a longitudinal approach to investigate adolescent CSR and provides practical implications for the health of adolescents. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).