But a new study of toddlers finds that during sleep, their brains are forming dramatic and visible connections. The study also found it doesn't take long for those connections to take place.
"Even within a night of sleep, these connections changed and strengthened," Salome Kurth of CU-Boulder, who led the research team, says.
But Kurth cautioned that parents shouldn't panic if kids miss a few good nights of sleep, saying the important thing is for children to have nightly routines and set bedtimes.
The study appears in a recent issue of the journal “Brain Sciences.”
