How Does Sleep Affect Memory?

Conducting tests with memory cards to explore how sleep affects memory.
Mahmoud Atieh
Grade 6

Hypothesis

I hypothesize that the quantity of sleep affects memory only if the amount is sufficiently high every night and that it is the key factor in the question.

Research

Sleep deprivation affects your ability to learn in two ways. Because you can't focus as well, it's more difficult to pick up information, so you can't learn as efficiently. Lack of sleep can hinder you from thinking clearly. It also affects memory, which is essential to learning. When we first form memories, they’re in a very raw and fragile form. Lack of sleep affects a part of the brain called the hippocampus, which is key for new memories. You accumulate many memories, moment by moment, while you’re awake. Most will be forgotten during the day. Studies show that excessive sleepiness can hurt work performance 

Variables

 My controlled variable is my memory cards which stay the same for the entire testing process

 

My municipal variable is the tested contestince which is changing every test.

 

My final variable is the score of the contestants which can change by every municipal variable.   

Procedure

1. I showed the person I was testing the 5 cards and asked them to memorize and record the 5 words on the back of their heads.

2. I asked them to record their sleep

3. I waited until the next day

4. I asked the person to recite the 5 cards

5. I analyzed  their score and compared it to other scores and variables

Observations

On the first test, I started to notice that maybe age had a role to play in the answer

I observed on the fifth day of testing that the 3 contestants I tested so far had trouble with the second word on the second card

On the 12 day of testing, I started to see actual differences in scores as they left the range of 8/20

 

Analysis

Throughout my testing, I analyzed that  sleep has a huge effect on memory but I did not anticipate that age would have such a key role in memory as humans get older their memory starts to wear out causing confusion and forgetfulness 

Conclusion

In conclusion, my experiments have indicated that: age has a crucial role to play in memory but I did not predict that it would have such a Jurassic role in the hippocampus and the memory and 2 that yes, quantity does play a role in our memory and sleep but against my hypothesis it is not the only key factor in the problem age the clock they slept at and if their schedule is constant and not changing every night are also factors.

Application

I feel that it is essential to take care of our body, and this is not only true for our diet and physical well-being but also for our mental and hidden physical features, more commonly known as our inner physical being. Hence, our sleep and rest schedules are also crucial for our health. This is proven in my testing between tests 6 and 1, where both participants were close to the same age, but the difference lay in the quantity of sleep. When one had slept for close to ten hours, the other had not even surpassed seven. This also showed in their scores; when test one had received one of the highest scores, the other was the only one not to get any answers correct.

 

Sources Of Error

I feel like I should have conducted more testing as to compare scores better with more information. I also think that I should have tested the person over several days to get an average sleep score

Acknowledgement

I acknowledge that I had used the help of my parents in placing material on to the tri-fold and that I had asked for their judgements on how I should make the graphs on the trifold,