Introduction & Literature Review

1) What are the key terms/concepts that we need to understand? What do they mean?
- Dichotic listening: two different auditory stimuli are presented simultaneously, one in the
left and one in the right ear.
- Sleep deprivation:
- REA: right-ear advantage; more correct for right ear, possibly due to left hemisphere
language (left hemisphere connected to right ear) when these are verbal tasks
- Hemispheric asymmetry: it is regarded as being determined by the interaction by two
separate processes. One process reflects structural laterality and is a stimulus-driven,
bottom-up process. The other is an instruction-driven, top-down, bottom-up process.

2) What are the 2-3 cited articles in this section that help set the stage for the current article?
- Asbjørnsen and Hugdahl (1995)
- Davies and Parasuraman (1982)
- Smith and Maben (1993)
- Sprague, Porter and Schumsky (1980)
- Hugdahl & Anderson (1986): can get a LEA if instructed to attend to left ear (forced-left)

3) What is the gap in knowledge that the current article is trying to address? What is the
research question? Why is this question important?
- No study has looked at the combined effects of asymmetry and sleep deprivation on
vigilance or sustained attention.
- Th purpose of the study was to investigate the effect of changes in sustained attention on
hemisphere functioning and the dynamic interaction between bottom-up and top-down
processing during sleep deprivation.
- Res Q: How would sleep deprivation affect performance in a dichotic listening task and
would it influence hemispheric functioning?

Methods
4) Who are the participants and what was the sample size? Were these appropriate for the
study?
- 25 cadets at the Royal Norwegian Naval Academy in Bergen.
- 12 – sleep deprived; 13 – non-deprived
- Age ranging from 21-28 years.
-  This isn’t the most generalizable sample.

5) What were the IV(s), DV(s), and design(s)? what were the key materials and apparatus?
What were the key procedural details?
- IV:
o sleep deprived vs. non-deprived (quasi IV)
o non-forced vs. forced-right vs. forced-left
o right ear vs. left ear
- DV: correct syllable responses
- Design:
o sleep deprived vs. non-deprived – between-subjects
o NF vs. FR vs. FL – within-subjects
 o Right vs. left – within-subjects
- Two groups of healthy right-handed males were tested with the dichotic listening method.
One group was sleep deprived after a strenuous military exercise and another group had
had normal sleep.
- There were three conditions in the DL test.
o Non-Forced: subjects were told that they would be presented with a list of nonsense
syllables; two different syllables at each trial, one in each ear.
o Forced-Right: subjects were instructed to direct their attention to the right ear and
report the syllable from right ear only.
o Forced-Left: subjects were instructed to direct their attention to the left ear and
report the syllable from left ear only.
- A 2 (sleep-deprived vs. non-deprived) x 3 (NF vs. FR s. FL) x 2 (right ear vs. left ear) split-plot
factorial design was performed.
 Dichotic listening task that cycled thru six different syllables
 IV-1: Sleep Condition (no deprivation vs. deprived—average 2.5 hrs) – between-subs
 IV-2: DL condition (NF: no forced ear; FR: forced right; FL: forced left) – within-subs
 DV: Number of correct responses

6) What were the research hypotheses?

- fewer overall correct syllables in the DL task would be reported from sleep-deprived
subjects than from non-deprived subjects.
- An REA was predicted in both the NF and FR attentional conditions
- Unclear what will happen in FL (forced left) in sleep deprivation condition because of
reduction in vigilance due to sleep.
 Sleep deprivation will lead to poorer overall performance (decrement in sustained
attention)
 REA predicted for both NF (non-forced) and FR (forced right)
 Unclear what will happen in FL (forced left) in sleep deprivation condition because of reduction
in vigilance due to sleep.

Results
7) What are the main results of the study (as they related to the IV(s) of interest)?
- NF: Sleep deprived right ear showed more correct responses than left ear in both sleep-
deprived and non-deprived subjects, and non-deprived right ear.
- FR: more correct right ear responses were found both the sleep-deprived and non-deprived
subjects.
- FL: more correct left ear than right ear responses were found only for non-deprived subjets.
- The non-deprived group reported significantly more correct right ear responses in the FR
condition, and more left ear responses in the FL condition, compared with the sleep-
deprived group.
 NF: REA for both non-deprived and deprived participants (as predicted)
 FR: REA for both non-deprived and deprived participants (as predicted)
 FL: LEA only for non-deprived; no LEA for sleep-deprived

8) Were the results consistent with the research hypotheses? Can they be generalized beyond
the context of the study?
- The results are consistent with the research hypotheses.
- It can be generalized to a larger armed forces population, however, it might be a little hard
to generalize to a more general population since the cadets are trained very hardly and are
usually with improved attention skills.
-  They didn’t make a clear prediction for FL, but it was in line with what they seems to be
suggesting could happen.

Discussion
9) How do these findings mesh with previous research on this topic?
- Results are consistent with past research.
- REA results in NF and FR are consistent with predictions and past research
- LEA for non-deprived is consistent with past research
- No LEA for deprived is consistent with the idea that right hemisphere vigilance would be
more affected by sleep deprivation and hamper left ear performance accordingly.

10) Are there any obvious limitations of the study or general critiques of the article?
- Having a fixed sequence of conditions gave a procedural element to the experiment which
might have influenced the results.
- No obvious limitations.

11) Did the authors identify directions for future-research?

- Nothing specific was mentioned.

12) What was the overall take-home message of the article?

- 30 male cadets participated in a study to show the decrease in sustained attention in sleep
deprived condition. The study also deals with hemispheric asymmetry where Right Ear
Advantage meaning right ear performed better even when the participants were sleep-
deprived or not.
- Typically, people show a REA in a dichotic listening task, unless they are forced to attend
only to the left ear (in which case, they show a LEA). Sleep deprivation has been shown to
negatively influence vigilance tasks, which appear to be a right hemisphere process
(which controls left ear). The present research showed that an LEA is possible in a FL
condition, but only when not sleep deprived. When sleep deprived, the right hemisphere
vigilance abilities are impaired, and participants can no longer show a LEA in a FL
condition.