睡眠对儿童执行功能的影响

近期研究表明, 睡眠总量和睡眠质量都会对儿童执行功能的发展造成影响, 在自然睡眠条件下, 睡眠质量的影响倾向于即时性, 睡眠总量的影响具有滞后性, 在实验干预条件下, 少量的睡眠延长提高了儿童的执行功能表现。睡眠问题中研究最为广泛的睡眠呼吸障碍也会对儿童的执行功能带来危害, 但由于方法的不同, 目前的研究在结论上并不一致。随着年龄的增长, 睡眠对儿童执行功能的影响会逐步降低。此外, 基因、家庭社会经济地位等内外部因素也会对研究结果产生影响。未来的研究应针对执行功能中认知灵活性这一成分进行加强。

Understanding the Effects of Sleep on Children’s Executive Functions

Recent research has shown that both sleep duration and sleep quality could affect the development of children’s executive functions. Under natural conditions, sleep quality tends to be a real-time influence factor, sleep duration has a delayed influence on the executive functions. While under experimental control, a small extension of sleep duration would improve children’s executive functions. Sleep-disordered breathing, which causes harm to children’s executive functions, has been most extensively researched in the area of sleeping disorders. However, there is no consistent conclusion so far due to the different research methods. The effects of sleep on children’s executive functions would gradually reduce with age. Furthermore, other factors could play a role, such as genes and family socioeconomic status. Future studies should pay attention to the shifting component of executive functions.