Post-Learning Offline Pauses Support Consolidation Beyond the Mind-Wandering State
José Costa Dias1, Philippe Peigneux1
1UR2NF-Neuropsychology and Functional Neuroimaging Research Unit, CRCN-Centre for Research in Cognition and Neurosciences, UNI-ULB Neuroscience Institute, Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB), 1050 Bruxelles, Belgium.
Clocks & Sleep
|April 24, 2026
Summary
Brief rest periods after mind-wandering (MW) episodes may enhance memory consolidation. However, pauses benefited memory regardless of MW, suggesting interrupted learning aids consolidation.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Neuroscience
- Psychology
Background:
- Offline memory consolidation is supported by wakeful resting periods and local sleep mechanisms.
- Mind-wandering (MW) may indicate a need for local sleep and transitions to offline processing.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate if rest periods after MW episodes enhance memory consolidation.
- To determine if MW-specific pauses selectively improve memory compared to general pauses.
Main Methods:
- Participants learned word pairs, with thought probes assessing MW.
- Experiment 1: Pauses were given after MW episodes; Experiment 2 compared MW-specific pauses to general pauses.
- Memory consolidation was assessed after learning blocks.
Main Results:
- Memory consolidation was enhanced in the MW condition compared to controls in Experiment 1.
- Performance improved equally whether pauses were MW-specific or general in Experiment 2.
- A positive correlation was found between MW intensity and memory consolidation across both experiments.
Conclusions:
- Transiently interrupting learning with rest periods may benefit declarative memory consolidation during wakefulness.
- The memory benefits of pauses appear partially independent of the attentional state (MW).
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