Learn While You Sleep

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-superhuman-mind/201212/learn-while-you-sleep

Despite being a much-researched topic, there is still much to discover regarding the nature of sleep. Most of this research is centered on dreams as well as determining the uses of sleep, but this article offers some insight into another oft-overlooked, and highly practical aspect of sleep: can we learn while we sleep? The article actually maintains that in a variety of ways, we can. Using what they term “differential partial reinforcement trace conditioning,” researchers managed to demonstrate that we’re even able to detect smells and react to them while we sleep. Moreover, other studies have shown that individuals can be conditioned to pair a tone with an odor while asleep. This surprising finding indicates that we can learn, at the very least basic things even if we’re not conscious of this learning.

The article goes on to explain that given the fact that we spend almost thirty percent of our lives asleep, it would prove to be immensely helpful if we could further our learning and reinforce our memories during this time. They argue that if the aforementioned results are truly derived from a meaningful association between the pleasantness of the smell and its subsequent tone recognition, then listening to a foreign language, perhaps, can likewise result in learning.

Do you think that this is a likely conclusion or that more research is needed to come to such powerful conclusions? Is their methodology sound or perhaps too far removed from the practical applications they claim?