Your brain wave patterns resemble those captured when you are awake. When you enter REM sleep, your respiration and brain activity increases. This stage is called REM sleep because of the rapid eye-movements that can be observed while you are in this part of the cycle. This is the last of the N-REM (non-rapid eye movement) sleep stages. Parasomnias like bedwetting, night terrors and sleepwalking generally occur during this part of the sleep cycle. Often called delta sleep because of the delta wave brain activity pattern captured on the EEG, the fourth stage lasts for about thirty minutes and sleepers in this stage can be very difficult to wake-up. Depending on the researcher, this stage and stage 4 may be combined as they are nearly identical. Your brain activity shows the deep slow pattern of delta waves during this twenty to thirty minute stage. The third stage of sleep is the transition from light sleep to the deepest type of sleep. This is the first stage where the brain and body begin to have a divergent experience, the brain becoming more active as the body becomes more passive. Your body further relaxes and your body temp decreases as your heart rate slows down. Although your brain waves get much more rapid and are punctuated with rhythmic spindles, you appear completely unconscious during this stage. The second stage of sleep lasts for about twenty minutes and is the least active of the sleep cycle stages. Stage 1 is only encountered at the beginning of the first sleep cycle when you fall asleep and, unlike other stages, is not repeated over the course of the night. Lasting about five to ten minutes, someone awakened while in this light sleep stage may not even think they have slept. During this stage, your brain shows theta wave patterns on the EEG. Light sleep, the transition from being awake to being asleep, is the first official stage of sleep and the beginning of the sleep cycle. Myoclonic jerks, the random, sudden startled movement of a body part, also happen during this pre-sleep stage. During this timeframe you may experience hypnogogic hallucinations like feeling as if you are falling or hearing someone call your name. Here is everything you need to know about the 5 stages of sleep and what is happening in your brain and body at each point in the sleep cycle.Īs your body relaxes and you settle in to fall asleep, your brain activity displays a small, fast wave pattern called beta waves. After several minutes you enter that twilight-type state of almost asleep as your body continues to relax and your brain switches to alpha waves. With the data made available by the EEG and other testing, scientists have formed a comprehensive understanding of sleep and how the different stages of sleep relate to each other. With the introduction of the electroencephalogram or EEG, scientists were given a new view into how we sleep and the ability to study sleep in completely new ways.
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