Poorer sleep health is associated with altered brain activation during cognitive control processing in healthy adults

Abstract

This study investigated how proactive and reactive cognitive control processing in the brain was associated with habitual sleep health. BOLD fMRI data were acquired from 81 healthy adults with normal sleep (41 females, age 20.96–39.58 years) during a test of cognitive control (Not-X-CPT). Sleep health was assessed in the week before MRI scanning, using both objective (actigraphy) and self-report measures. Multiple measures indicating poorer sleep health—including later/more variable sleep timing, later chronotype preference, more insomnia symptoms, and lower sleep efficiency—were associated with stronger and more widespread BOLD activations in fronto-parietal and subcortical brain regions during cognitive control processing (adjusted for age, sex, education, and fMRI task performance). Most associations were found for reactive cognitive control activation, indicating that poorer sleep health is linked to a “hyper-reactive” brain state. Analysis of time-on-task effects showed that, with longer time on task, poorer sleep health was predominantly associated with increased proactive cognitive control activation, indicating recruitment of additional neural resources over time. Finally, shorter objective sleep duration was associated with lower BOLD activation with time on task and poorer task performance. In conclusion, even in “normal sleepers,” relatively poorer sleep health is associated with altered cognitive control processing, possibly reflecting compensatory mechanisms and/or inefficient neural processing.

Sleep–wake behavior, perceived fatigability, and cognitive reserve in older adults

“…There are a series of changes associated with sleep–wake patterns 36 in cognition, function, and behavior from resilience (compensation) to impairment (decompensation) to the loss of circadian rhythmicity during transitions from preclinical cognitive impairment to dementia 37 . In patients with aMCI, SRI explained 26.3% of fatigability and 14% of declined CogAb, suggesting that nearly 75% of perceived fatigability was caused by other contributing and facilitating factors.…”

It is Monday again: Weekend sleep differentially relates to the workweek via reattachment on Monday

“…On the one hand, cognitive and energetic resources that have built up through high-quality sleep during the weekend (Leong & Chee, 2023;Scullin & Bliwise, 2015) can transfer into the work domain by successfully reattaching to work and, in turn, decrease workweek exhaustion and increase task performance. On the other hand, lower cognitive and energetic resources due to catchup sleep and social sleep lag (Ashforth et al, 2000;Kim et al, 2011;Smevik et al, 2023)…”

“…As circadian preferences can lead to large differences in sleep behavior between the weekend and the workweek (Leger et al, 2020; Wittmann et al, 2006), it is relevant to better understand how these differences in sleep behavior affect employees when returning to work on Monday. An inconsistency in sleep duration and timing might decrease employees' cognitive functioning (e.g., Chaput et al, 2020; Smevik et al, 2023) and thus, also relate to their workweek. Using a weekly diary design and focusing on differences between employees' workweek and weekend sleep enables us to investigate sleep characteristics that usually cannot be assessed in daily diary designs (i.e., weekend catch‐up sleep) or have so far mostly been operationalized as stable between‐person differences (i.e., social sleep lag, Kühnel et al, 2016; Völker et al, 2024).…”

From Reward to Anhedonia-Dopamine Function in the Global Mental Health Context

“…While healthy, positive stimulation of the reward system promotes healthy sleep, compulsive reward-seeking, on the other hand, leads to the asynchronization of the circadian rhythm [80][81][82][83], centrally controlled by serotonin and responsible for dysfunctional sleep patterns. Pathological changes in sleep patterns and behavior are a product of pathological brain adaptation involving antagonistic processes (allostasis) that lead to irritability, dysphoria, anxiety, and anhedonia in what is sometimes called the brain's anti-reward system [80][81][82][83][84][85][86]. Because compulsive reward-seeking literally usurps everyday behavior, i.e., eating, sexuality, exercise, and others, it "hijacks" the natural effects of substances or activities that produce pleasure through the release of dopamine [1,12,17].…”