Work

Early life adversity and adolescent sleep problems during the COVID‐19 pandemic

Year: 2023

Type: article

Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in a reorganization of adolescents' routines, especially their sleep schedules. Utilising 175 caregiver-adolescent dyads, the current study examined associations of biological (e.g., prenatal substance use), environmental (e.g., poverty), and relational (e.g., child maltreatment) subtypes of early life adversity (ELA) with various components of adolescents' sleep across the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Relational ELA explained unique variance in adolescents' sleep disturbances, but not other sleep components, following short- and longer-term exposure to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the direction of this association switched such that relational ELA predicted decreased sleep disturbances during the initial phase of the U.S. COVID-19 pandemic in spring 2020 beyond pre-pandemic levels, but, over time, contributed to increased sleep disturbances beyond early-pandemic levels as the pandemic extended into the winter of 2020.

Source: Stress and Health

DOI: 10.1002/smi.3332

Authors: Jessie M. Bridgewater, Sara R. Berzenski, Stacey N. Doan, Tuppett M. Yates

Institutions: University of California, Riverside, California State University, Northridge, Claremont McKenna College

Language: English

Topic: Sleep and related disorders

Subfield: Experimental and Cognitive Psychology

Field: Psychology

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Good health and well-being

Open Access status: bronze

Funders: National Science Foundation, University of California, Irvine, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development