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Offline memory consolidation during waking rest

Nature Reviews Psychology volume 1, pages 441–453 (2022)Cite this article

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Abstract

People spend approximately half of their waking hours in a so-called offline state — daydreaming, mind wandering or otherwise inattentive to their surroundings. These activities are often viewed as a waste of time, perhaps as moments of lost productivity. However, periods of offline waking rest can facilitate the consolidation of newly formed memories. Even a few minutes of rest with closed eyes can improve memory, perhaps to the same degree as a full night of sleep. These findings have profound implications for understanding the memory consolidation process, its time course and its underlying mechanisms. In this Review, I describe evidence that offline waking rest retroactively facilitates memory. Similar to the beneficial effect of sleep, the effect of rest might be driven by neural-level reactivation of newly formed memory traces. As both rest and sleep seem to support consolidation, I next consider whether these two states support the same or dissociable stages of consolidation. Then I review evidence that seconds-long bouts of offline rest occur throughout the day and that even these ultrashort offline periods might benefit memory. Finally, I conclude by describing future directions for research into the underlying processes of sleep and wake states.

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Fig. 1: The effect of offline waking rest on memory.
Fig. 2: Oscillations proposed to support consolidation.
Fig. 3: Potential mechanisms of memory consolidation in wake and sleep.
Fig. 4: Potential roles of sleep and offline waking rest in memory consolidation.
Fig. 5: Seconds-long offline states while performing a cognitive task.

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Acknowledgements

E.J.W.’s laboratory has been funded by the National Science Foundation (BCS-1849026), the National Institute of Mental Health (R15MH107891), and the BIAL Foundation (Bursaries Award 211/16).

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  1. Department of Psychology, Furman University, Greenville, SC, USA

    Erin J. Wamsley

  2. Program in Neuroscience, Furman University, Greenville, SC, USA

    Erin J. Wamsley

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Wamsley, E.J. Offline memory consolidation during waking rest. Nat Rev Psychol 1, 441–453 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44159-022-00072-w

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