At the Ruhr University Bochum in Germany new research and experiments on the correlation between napping and memory-retention in infants have had results that suggest napping may in fact increase a baby’s memory.

Researchers conducted two experiments to test and see if this correlation exists. Between each experiment a total of 216 babies were tested. In the two experiments babies ranging from six to 12 months were taught how to remove mittens from animal puppets. Then half of the testing pool were sent to nap, while the other half remained awake.

Results showed that only the babies that took naps after they learned how to remove the mittens remembered how to carry out the task–they even remembered this information a full day later.

The study author Sabine Seehagen, a child and adolescent psychology researcher at the same Ruhr University Bochum, stated this about the research, “While people might assume that infants learn best when they are wide awake, our findings suggest that the time just before infants go down for sleep can be a particularly valuable learning opportunity.”

While this new research suggests that naps do increase the ability of infants to remember, it is not concrete, and the specifics about how long a baby should nap and how often, to increase memory has not been discovered yet.

Angela Lukowski, an assistant professor of psychology and social behavior at the University of California, Irvine, mentioned this concerning how parents should interpret the information: “the lesson for parents seems to be that napping after learning may help infants remember information over time.”

Naps, however, do not increase the memory of adults.

So this news is strictly for the babies.