Exposure to Different Forms of Violence Affects Kids’ Sleep Differently

I have a guest post today with the British Psychological Society's Research Digest blog. The piece is based on a new study in the journal Sleep Medicine showing that children exposed to different forms of violence in their community are plagued with different types of disturbed sleep.

Two particular types of violence stood out to researchers in terms of their association with sleep disturbance. Controlling for relevant confounders (such as age, gender and family income), individuals who were physically assaulted had a shortened sleep duration (by 35 minutes on average), exhibited almost three times as much wake time after sleep onset, and 6 per cent lower sleep efficiency than kids who did not experience physical assault. These effects were also seen three months later at follow-up. 

On the other hand, children who witnessed a homicide had twice as much wake time after sleep onset, greater night-to-night variability in sleep duration, and more self-reported sleep problems than kids who had not witnessed a homicide. These findings, however, did not persist at follow-up.

Read more of the post here!