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Psychology

Insight and the sleep committee

Nature volume 427, pages 304–305 (2004)Cite this article

We all spend about a third of our lives asleep, an essential but seemingly unproductive state. Experimental evidence now emerges to support anecdotal evidence that sleep can stimulate creative thinking.

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Figure 1: Instances of insight and creativity said to have followed sleep (or rather, except in the case of Massenet, occurring during or following a dream).

MGM/THE KOBAL COLLECTION; ALFRED PASIEKA/SPL; SPL; MARY EVANS PICTURE LIBRARY; CORBIS

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. the Cyclotron Research Centre, University of Liège, Allée du 6 Août, 8 Sart Tilman, Liège, B-4000, Belgium

    Pierre Maquet & Perrine Ruby

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  1. Pierre Maquet
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  2. Perrine Ruby
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Correspondence to Pierre Maquet.

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Maquet, P., Ruby, P. Insight and the sleep committee. Nature 427, 304–305 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/427304a

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