The Brain At Night
August 23, 2007 by Kristina Chew, PhD
Filed under Health
The brain learns better at night, according to a study by postgraduate student Martin Sale and his colleagues from the University of Adelaide. Notes today’s Science Daily:
His study found that larger changes [in the brain's capacity to control hand movement] are induced when the experiments are performed in the evening, as compared with mornings.
“Such time-of-day variations in function are not unusual. Organisms are adapted to the continual change in light and dark during a 24 hour period to avoid predators and to reproduce faster,” he says.
“For example, the petals of many flowers only open during the day, while some organisms only reproduce at night. In humans, these rhythms are governed by a variety of hormones that control many bodily functions.”
Sometimes it does seem that Charlie is at his most alert, active, and engaging around 9pm—while at 9am, he is often (as his teachers have noted) sluggish and slower-moving (fortunately, he had P.E. at 11am last year—this helped wake him up and refocus). I’ve noted that year-round school seems like a good idea for Charlie—–what about “night school” too……….
Maybe being an owl in terms of one’s sleep patterns is not such a bad thing, indeed.
Before my child was diagnosed with epilepsy, we found that the best ’settled’ learning time was around 8-9 at night after a full day of activity.
anti-convulsant medications (tough to find the the right ones for many people )but when they work, astonishing how much the body seems to regulate and adjust to learning during the day.
Now it is time for night time reading!
caroline,
send me an e-mail…my son has epilepsy and also is autistic…most of his seizures occur during the night while he is sleeping or coming out of sleep.
I’ve been wondering about the time Charlie takes his medication—-he takes it in the morning to get the effects during the day but I think it might also make him drowsy. Always a guessing game….
Does this contradict that study I heard about that stated we are most “creative” in the morning? The implication was that “creative’ meant more conducive to studying and work.
My son got a lot of homework in 1st grade and it was suggested to us to schedule it in the afternoon, immediately after school. We figured he needed a BIG break and always had him do it at 7:00pm, after dinner and providing enough time for break and shower.
I’m my best from 10PM – 2 AM and 10AM – 2PM. When I worked full-time, that would be when I was the most productive, creative, focused, etc. Of course my life doesn’t really cater to that, but if it were possible, that’s what my schedule would center around! Both of my boys would much rather stay up until 11 or later and sleep in until 9 or later. Unfortunately school and work aren’t willing to accomodate to our schedules.
Hi John S.,
Epilepsy can be difficult to treat and while certain medications may work well for some do not work to control epileptic events in others. Side effects can be overwhelming for an individual but hard to assess in people who have communication difficulties.
Untreated or uncontrolled epilepsy can mimic autism symptoms. It is not just a side issue or an additional medical diagnosis. Sometimes epilepsy can be the root of the communication, motor deficits and when successfully treated, the person is more verbal, able to ‘function’ rather than be in pain.
did your child lose speech or other skills?
Medication times are soooo tricky. If a person is taking medication for calming effects absolutely can make one more drowsey. I wonder about trying it at night with the Dr.’s ok? could be a bumpy night though!
To John S. and Caroline L. – our child also has seizure disorder; our neurologist (who has experience with both autism and epilepsy) says that about 20% of children on the spectrum have some form of seizure disorder. M’s seizures also tend to occur at night and in the morning shortly after waking, though we’ve had our share of grand mals during the day as well (often after exhaustion, etc).
(responding to Caroline – our child did lose significant language, and did not start having visible seizures until more than a year after the initial PDD diagnosis — though it’s possible that there were some undetected seizures before then).
If any of you have any good resources on seizures and autism, I’d be delighted to know about them…
Here is a very useful website about epilepsy and loss of speech:
(do not know how to glue it in here apologies)
http://www.friendsoflks.com/medical_overview
You may want to explore LKS and talk to your neuro given ’significant langauge’ loss – it is always a big clue combined with epilepsy. M. may have been ’spiking’ at night and no way to tell except by the child waking up before speech loss and seizures developed.
weekend is here and busy for me but I’ll catch up here on Monday.
I’ll try this again
http://www.friendsoflks.com
you can google LKS, friends of LKS, FOLKS