Investigating the Impact of Habitual Sleep Quality on Episodic Memory Performance: An EEG-Based Representational Similarity Analysis

Abstract

Sleep is crucial for episodic memory consolidation, yet the impact of habitual sleep quality on memory performance remains underexplored. This study investigates the relationship between sleep quality and episodic memory retrieval using EEG-based representational similarity analysis (RSA). Thirty-six participants wore wrist accelerometers for one week to capture habitual sleep patterns, including total sleep time and restlessness. Memory performance was assessed through a paired associate learning task, with EEG data recorded during encoding and retrieval phases. RSA was applied to EEG oscillatory power across time-frequency windows to examine the neural similarity between encoding and retrieval. The results showed both positive and negative correlations between sleep metric and memory performance, with sleep restlessness being linked to both increases and decreases in neural similarity across specific clusters. These findings emphasize the important role of sleep quality in shaping the neural processes underlying episodic memory retrieval, indicating a strong connection between sleep patterns and memory function.