Age-related changes in the time course of vigilant attention during 40 hours without sleep in men.
OBJECTIVE
To examine whether vigilant attention and sleepiness develop differently during prolonged wakefulness in young and older men.


METHODS
Psychomotor vigilance task (PVT) performance and subjective sleepiness were determined in 14 sessions at 3 hour intervals in healthy young (n = 12, mean age: 25.2 years, range: 21-31 years) and older (n = 11, mean age: 66.4 years, range: 61-70 years) men who were kept awake for 40 hours under continuous supervision in a sleep laboratory and on the morning after the recovery night.


RESULTS
PVT speed, response lapses and performance variability, and subjective sleepiness were analyzed. Sleep deprivation led to reversal of an age-related difference in PVT speed at the circadian trough of performance on the morning of the second day of prolonged wakefulness (Session x Age interaction: P < .0006). Beginning after 22 hours of wakefulness, the young men also produced more lapses (P < .004), showed higher performance instability (P < .0001), and felt sleepier (P < .03) than older men, especially during the morning after the night without sleep.


CONCLUSIONS
Vigilant attention is more impaired after 1 night without sleep in young men than in older men, which has important implications for the prevention of accidents associated with the loss of sleep.
Adam
Martin
M
Institute of Pharmacology & Toxicology and Center for Integrative Human Physiology (CIHP), University of Zürich, Switzerland.
Rétey
Julia V
JV
Khatami
Ramin
R
Landolt
Hans-Peter
HP
D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology*; D001143:Arousal / Q000502:physiology*; D001288:Attention; D001334:Automobile Driving; D002940:Circadian Rhythm / Q000502:physiology; D003072:Cognition Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000209:etiology; D006970:Disorders of Excessive Somnolence / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009042:Motivation; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology; D011930:Reaction Time; D012892:Sleep Deprivation / Q000150:complications* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D013997:Time Factors