It is usually thought that a good night’s sleep helps one stay away from diseases. However, those who have undergone through traumatic event could face problem when it comes to sleep. And according to a new study, if one deprives himself of sleep, they could be benefited in case of flashbacks of traumatic memories.

The new study has been led by the University of Oxford. It has been found by scientists at Oxford’s Sleep and Circadian Neuroscience Institute that people having less sleep recalled less traumatic memories. Researchers checked the response of participants after varying amounts of sleep. They showed them emotional film clips of traumatic scenes to monitor that.

Researchers conducted the study by keeping them in a laboratory and depriving of sleep or sending them home to get normal night’s sleep. They recorded that any disturbing memories they experienced while sleeping.

According to Dr Katharina Wulff, from the SCNi, it is known that sleep helps improve memory performance together with emotional memory, however sometimes this may also lead to problems.

Dr Kate Porcheret, from the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences said that patients still receive sedatives following a traumatic event in order to sleep, however this could be a wrong thing for much traumatized people.

Dr Porcheret said, “Finding out more how sleep and trauma interact means we can ensure people are well cared for after a traumatic event… we need more research in both experimental and clinical settings into how our response to psychological trauma is affected by sleep”.

As per the team behind the study, less is known about disturbing memories of emotional events.