Sara Mednick
Professor of Cognitive Sciences | UC Irvine
Irvine, CA, UNITED STATES
Sara Mednick is an expert in memory consolidation, sleep, aging and brain stimulation and author of “The Power of the Downstate.”
Media
Publications:
Documents:
Videos:
Audio/Podcasts:
Biography
Sara C. Mednick is Professor of Cognitive Sciences at the University of California, Irvine and author of the book, Take a Nap! Change Your Life. (Workman). She is passionate about understanding how the brain works through her research into sleep and cognition. Mednick’s seven-bedroom sleep lab at UCI works literally around-the-clock to discover methods for boosting cognition through a range of different interventions including napping, brain stimulation with electricity, sound and light, as well as pharmacological interventions. Additionally, her lab is interested in how sleep changes throughout the menstrual cycle and lifespan. Her science has been continuously federally funded (National Institute of Health, National Science Foundation, Department of Defense Office of Naval Research, DARPA). Mednick was awarded the Office Naval Research Young Investigator Award in 2015. Her research findings have been published in such leading scientific journals as Nature Neuroscience and The Proceedings from the National Academy of Science, and covered by all major media outlets. She received a BA from Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY, in Drama/Dance. After college, her experience working in the psychiatry department at Bellevue Hospital in New York, inspired her to study the brain and how to make humans smarter through better sleep. She received a PhD in Psychology from Harvard University, and then completed a postdoc at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies and UC San Diego.
Areas of Expertise (5)
Memory Consolidation
Aging
Sleep
Pharmacology
Cognitive Science
Education (2)
Harvard University: PhD, Psychology 2003
Bard College: BA, Drama/Dance 1994
Links (7)
Media Appearances (5)
‘Artificial Nap’ Could Provide Benefits of Sleep—Without Sleeping
Scientific American online
2025-03-26
These findings imply that brain stimulation could deliver some of the benefits of naps without sleep. The results in primates strongly suggest “artificial nap” effects will translate to humans, says Sara Mednick, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Irvine, who studies the relation between napping and performance; evidence already exists that electrical stimulation during sleep can benefit humans’ memory. “This work demonstrates that stimulating [when awake] at the delta frequency can mimic sleep benefits,” Mednick says.
What dreams are made of: Scientists mine sleep’s mysteries
The Washington Post online
2025-02-08
Sara Mednick, a cognitive scientist at the University of California, Irvine, said she views dreams as a “safe space where we can bring up potentially emotionally charged experiences,” and then play out the possibilities. … In her research, Mednick has found that, for people who have experienced a negative emotional event, dreaming about it can help tamp down the attached emotions.
Feeling groggy in the afternoon? Here’s how to nap the right way
Associated Press online
2024-08-22
Shorter naps only include stage-two sleep, which is particularly helpful for alertness and memory, said Sara Mednick, a sleep researcher at University of California, Irvine. “It’s like putting yourself into low-power mode just for a little bit and letting your body recuperate,” said Mednick, author of “Take a Nap! Change Your Life.” Her research has found that naps work better than caffeine and a placebo to improve cognitive functioning. … Mednick recommended saving longer naps for the weekends, or when you have time to sleep a full 90 minutes. After about half an hour, you enter slow-wave sleep, which helps the body repair muscle tissue.
How to Take the Perfect Nap
Time online
2024-06-11
“We’re rhythmic animals,” says Sara Mednick, a sleep researcher at the University of California, Irvine. “Whenever you’re learning an activity, doing it regularly helps. … “When people regularly take longer naps, their nighttime sleep is similar to non-nappers,” Mednick says—so the extra rest is a bonus, instead of taking away from nighttime shut-eye. She suggests increasing your duration gradually over several weeks to get used to it. … Just napping with an alarm set for 60 minutes or a bit longer leads to a 40% increase in creativity, Mednick has found.
This Is How Our Dreams Actually Help Us With Real Life Experiences
HuffPost online
2024-05-15
Until now, many of us believed that dreams are just a series of images that play out in your mind while you sleep but according to researchers in the University of California, [Irvine] dreams can actually be key to helping us process and recover from bad experiences. … Sara Mednick, professor of cognitive sciences and lab director at the University of California, Irvine said: “This research gives us new insight into the active role dreams play in how we naturally process our day-to-day experiences and might lead to interventions that increase dreaming in order to help people work through hard life experiences.”
Articles (5)
New directions in sleep and memory research: the role of autonomic activity
Current Opinion in Behavioral SciencesLauren N Whitehurst, Pin-Chun Chen, Mohsen Naji, Sara C Mednick
2020 Over the last 100 years there has been a proliferation of research into the mechanisms of sleep that support cognition. Majority of these studies point to electroencephalographic features during sleep that are linked to plasticity and support valuable cognitive skills, like long-term memory.
The impact of psychostimulants on sustained attention over a 24-h period
CognitionLauren N Whitehurst, Sara Agosta, Roberto Castaños, Lorella Battelli, Sara C Mednick
2019 The off-label use of psychostimulants is a growing trend in healthy adults with many turning to these medications to increase alertness, attentional focus, and to help them study. However, the empirical literature on the efficacy of these medications for cognitive enhancement is controversial and the longer-term impact of these drugs on health and cognitive processing has not been thoroughly examined.
Timing between Cortical Slow Oscillations and Heart Rate Bursts during Sleep Predicts Temporal Processing Speed, but Not Offline Consolidation
Journal of Cognitive NeuroscienceMohsen Naji, Giri P Krishnan, Elizabeth A McDevitt, Maxim Bazhenov, Sara C Mednick
2019 Central and autonomic nervous system activities are coupled during sleep. Cortical slow oscillations (SOs;
Morning stimulant administration reduces sleep and overnight working memory improvement
Behavioural Brain ResearchTenzin Tselha, Lauren N Whitehurst, Benjamin D Yetton, Tina T Vo, Sara C Mednick
2019 The goal of cognitive enhancement is to improve mental functions using interventions including cognitive training, brain stimulation and pharmacology. Indeed, psychostimulants, commonly used for cognitive enhancement purposes, while preventing sleep, have been shown to increase working memory (WM) and attention.
Midday napping in children: associations between nap frequency and duration across cognitive, positive psychological well-being, behavioral, and metabolic health outcomes
SleepJianghong Liu, Rui Feng, Xiaopeng Ji, Naixue Cui, Adrian Raine, Sara C Mednick
2019 Poor sleep and daytime sleepiness in children and adolescents have short- and long-term consequences on various aspects of health. Midday napping may be a useful strategy to reduce such negative impacts. The effect of habitual napping on a wide spectrum of cognitive, behavioral, psychological, and metabolic outcomes has not been systematically investigated.
Social