Preservation of sleep benefits for associative and inferential memory in older adults

While sleep benefits memory consolidation in young adults, it remains unclear whether this advantage persists over aging. Using an associative inference task (AB/BC paradigm), we compared the effects of post-learning sleep versus equivalent wakefulness on associative (AB, BC) and inferential (AC) memory in older and young adults. Our study showed that sleep (vs. wake) enhanced associative memory retention in both age groups, while for inferential memory, a significant sleep benefit was observed in young adults, with a similar but non-significant trend in older adults. Critically, a direct comparison revealed that the magnitude of the sleep benefit for both memory types did not statistically differ between older and young adults. Refined analyses revealed that among older participants, sleep preferentially benefited poor performers in consolidating both associative and inferential memory. Furthermore, associative memory retention was positively correlated with subjective sleep quality in young adults, whereas inferential memory performance was linked to rapid eye movement (REM) sleep behavior score in older adults. Together, our results suggest that sleep’s role in memory consolidation remains largely intact in healthy aging, highlighting its potential contribution to support cognitive health in later life.