Rapid eye movement

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Rapid eye movement may refer to:

What is REM? Rapid eye movement is one of the five stages we go through when we sleep. During this stage of sleep we experience quick, random eye movements during the night. Most of us depending on age, experience REM between 20-25% of the night. Over your whole lifetime you spent about a fifth of sleep in REM. While we are in REM, we go through about 4 to 5 cycles of REM. Each cycle only lasts for a short period of time, but each cycle gets longer than the previous. During REM sleep most of our muscles become paralyzed and our brains neurons become very powerful. REM is part of our ancient evolutionary heritage. [1] Every living species go through the cycle of REM sleep. There is a relationship between age and the amount of REM sleep that a person (human) goes through. The younger you are the more REM you experience, which in turn means the older you are the less REM sleep you experience. [2]


  • The functions of REM

There are many theories about the functions of REM. It has been suggested that REM sleep is important for a various amount of things. Memory consolidation is one of the hypotheses that is still being tested, at this point, that is unproven. It has been studied that REM sleep is related to dreams that people experience. People who go through the cycle of REM have a clear picture and vivid memories of their dreams. Whereas people who don’t know go through the cycle of REM do not recall their dreams as clearly. Another theory that is suggested for REM sleep is that it is essentially important for infants to experience REM sleep. REM sleep is important because it gives the infants neural stimulation. It is important for infants to experience this stimulation in order to mature their neural connections. [3]

References

  1. ↑ Kalat, James W.. Biological psychology. 11th ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, 2013. Print.
  2. ↑ Nordqvist, Joseph. "What Is Rapid Eye Movement? What is REM?." Medical News Today. MediLexicon International, 17 July 2012. Web. 9 Dec. 2013. <http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles
  3. ↑ Purves, Dale. "Possible Functions of REM." The Possible Functions of REM Sleep and Dreaming. U.S. National Library of Medicine, 18 Jan. 2001. Web. 10 Dec. 2013. <http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK111

See also

  • REM (disambiguation)
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