A Mind's Voyage: Unearthing Realms of Emotion, Sleep and Mental Health

Numerous studies demonstrate that a lack of sleep increases next-day anxiety levels. However, we know very little about how a lack of sleep influences anxiety as it unfolds over time. During this talk, Dr Emma Sullivan will introduce you to a virtual world that they have developed to look at how a night of sleep deprivation (vs a night of sleep) influences anxiety as it unfolds during an unpredictably threatening immersive world. Moreover, they will show that certain individual differences, such as heart rate variability, may help protect against the effects of sleep loss on anxiety.

Our memory can be both a blessing and a curse. Although the places we go and people we see are usually reminders of happy times, they can also evoke unwanted memories about difficult life events. In this talk, Dr Scott Cairney hopes to convince you that our ability to keep such unwanted memories at bay is dependent on good quality sleep. Further, he will show that rapid eye movement (REM) sleep plays a particularly important role in controlling our memories of the past, and will outline how tools for modifying REM sleep could help people to overcome traumatic experiences.

The process of detecting inner-body sensations is called interoception and is a key factor in mental health conditions, particularly eating disorders. Eating disorders are classed by non-typical eating behaviours and have some of the highest death rates of all mental health diseases. Worryingly, eating disorder cases are on the rise.
Eating disorder patients describe differences in their interoception, most specifically gut feelings. Despite this, research has been largely focused on interoception of the heart - limiting our understandings of these disorders and their possible treatments. In this talk, Lucy Stafford will discuss the importance of interoception, including gastric (gut) interoception, to mental health and eating disorders. She will also provide insight on research currently being conducted on gastric interoception and talk about its future in eating disorder research.