Fuelling our Wellbeing through Sleep and Belonging

Have you ever felt lonely and noticed the world seems different? We see the world not as it is, but as we are. When we feel lonely, our perceptions shape the lens through which we view the world, especially when it comes to facial emotion processing, social interactions and memory. In this talk, we will shed light on these cognitive biases and discover how virtual reality offers an exciting path to study them. Join us to demystify loneliness through engaging, accessible science, and learn strategies to overcome loneliness.

Some people overcome trauma effectively, but others develop PTSD. One factor that increases the likelihood of developing PTSD is poor sleep. But why does poor sleep make people vulnerable to PTSD? To answer this question, I embarked on an ambitious research journey involving hundreds of brain scans, thousands of hours in the sleep lab, and countless restless nights. In my talk, I will reflect on my research journey. In doing so, I will explain how sleep deprivation weakens the brain’s defence mechanism against intrusive thoughts, which may help to explain the link between poor sleep and PTSD.

Sleep and emotions share intricate and complex relationships, with both being essential to healthy functioning. The effects of sleep loss on our emotions, whilst perhaps intuitive, remain poorly understood. Recent reviews highlight inconsistent effects of poor sleep on subjective emotional responses, likely resulting from the large variety of methods used and emotions investigated. In this talk I will discuss our recent synthesis of sleep and emotion research, which analysed multiple types of sleep loss and emotional outcomes from over 100 studies.