Sleeping like a baby: Examining relations between habitual infant sleep, recall memory, and generalization across cues at 10 months

Previous research suggests that sleep is related to cognitive functioning in infants and adults. In the present study, we examined whether individual differences in infant sleep habits over the seven days prior to elicited imitation testing were associated with variability in (a) the encoding of 2-step event sequences and (b) memory for the presented information and generalization across cues after a 2-h delay in 10-month-olds. Significant correlations indicated that both daytime napping and nighttime sleep were related to encoding and generalization across cues after the 2-h delay; significant findings were not found in relation to baseline or delayed recall performance. We suggest that individual differences in infant sleep habits may be one mechanism underlying the observed variability in recall memory and generalization as these abilities are coming online late in the first year of life.

► Habitual infant sleep and sleep after learning is associated with cognitive functioning in infants and adults. ► We examined relations between habitual infant sleep, recall memory, and generalization across cues in 10-month-old infants. ► Infants encoded the target actions; they also remembered the target actions and pairs of actions after a 2-h delay. ► Habitual infant sleep was associated with the encoding and delayed generalization of temporal order information. ► Future research should examine causal links between sleep and cognitive functioning in infancy and early childhood.