Good sleep may boost brain function: Study

Although she stresses that the study underscores the importance of a good night's sleep, she agrees that it's not possible to say that troubled sleep causes a decrease in

"We only know there's a relationship," says Michael Breus, an Arizona clinical psychologist who is board-certified in sleep disorders. "We don't know which came first."

Breus was not involved in the current study. He applauds the researchers for examining sleep patterns in war veterans, a group particularly plagued with disturbed sleep.

"If they've been in an active theater of war, they haven't slept well since they've been in an active war," he says.

He says polysomnography, which monitors people's sleep and collects objective data, would have made the results of the current study more meaningful.

Chao also says she would have preferred to use objective sleep data. But the current report was based on a second look at data from a prior study.

"The data says to us this could be a very interesting population to learn more about," Breus says. "If we can learn more about veteran sleep, we can help them sleep more."

Reuters