Outline the findings of studies into sleep deprivation and assess their implications for one or more theories of sleep.

Huber-Weidman (1976) reviewed a large number of sleep deprivation studies and summarised the finding into comment effects of total sleep deprivation over 6 nights. The effects included distress as a consequence of lack of sleep, strong desire to sleep, periods of micro-sleep and delusions. There is no standardisation of the methods employed and as it secondary research we cannot be absolutely sure of the methodology. However this study show that sleep deprivation can have negative effects and can be applied to the real world. It also supports restoration theory of sleep.

Rechtschaffen et al (1983), two rats were placed on a disc above water, one was able to sleep and the other one wasn’t as when the EEG indicated that sleep began the disk would move and so the rat fell into the water. The sleep deprived rat’s died within 33 days and the rats that not deprived of sleep suffered no ill effects after the study. There are Ethical issues with this study such as the study caused pain over 33 days to the rats then killed them and this study is unlikely to have any scientific advance. However the study does show that sleep deprivation can lead to death and therefore it could not have been done on humans. This study cannot be generalised to humans or other animals.

Dement (1960), systematically deprived participants of either NREM or REM sleep to test the differences between the two. Deprivation of REM sleep was more severe which included aggression and poor concentration. Also the REM deprived group, typed to enter REM from an average of 12 to 26 times by the 7th night. However after the study when the REM participants were allowed to sleep normally they spent much longer in REM as did Randy Gardner. This study supports Horne theory of sleep who distinguished between core (stage 4 and REM) sleep and optional (stages 1 – 3) sleep and claimed that only core sleep was critical for restoration of the brain as restoration of the body can occur during wakefulness. This is also supported by Stern and Morgan. Dement study does show that when deprived of REM sleep it can have more negative effects that NREM deprived sleep.

To conclude, both partial sleep deprivation and total sleep deprivation can have negative effects and in some cases lead to death.  Restoration Theory does have face validity as it makes sense and is highly plausible. There is also a need for further research into neurochemicals and the effects of sleep deprivation on health.