Subjectively reported sleep disruptions are associated with elevated next-day symptoms and intrusive memories.
Sleep disruptions reported in diaries correlate with increased PTSD symptoms the following day.
Participants experienced a higher number of intrusive memories after nights of disrupted sleep.
Objective sleep data did not show similar associations with PTSD symptoms.
Differences in the strength of associations were observed between male and female participants.
The study suggests potential factors like the COVID-19 pandemic may influence the relationship between sleep and PTSD.
Simplified
BACKGROUND: Disrupted sleep and post-traumatic stress disorder () are bi-directionally linked and have been found to mutually reinforce each other on a day-to-day basis. However, most of the previous research has focused on subjective measures of sleep only.
OBJECTIVE: Here, we investigated the temporal relationship between sleep and PTSD symptoms using both subjective (sleep diary) and objective measures of sleep ().
METHODS: Forty-one non-treatment seeking, trauma exposed young adults (age= 24.68,= 8.15) with a range of PTSD symptom severities (PTSS, 0-53 on PCL-5) were recruited. Participants completed two surveys per day over four weeks to measure day-time PTSD symptoms (i.e. PTSS and number of intrusions) and night-time sleep subjectively, while wearing an actigraphy watch to measure sleep objectively. M SD
RESULTS: Linear mixed models revealed that subjectively reported sleep disruptions were associated with elevated next-day PTSS and increasing number of intrusive memories both within and between participants. Similar results were found for daytime PTSD symptoms on night-time sleep. However, these associations were not found using objective sleep data. Exploratory moderator analyses including sex (male vs. female) found that these associations differed in strength between sexes but were generally in the same direction.
DISCUSSION: These results were in line with our hypothesis with regards to the sleep diary (subjective sleep), but not actigraphy (objective sleep). Several factors which have implications on both PTSD and sleep, such as the COVID-19 pandemic and/ or sleep-state misperception, may be potential reasons behind those discrepancies. However, this study had limited power and needs to be replicated in larger samples. Nonetheless, these results add to the current literature about the bi-directional relationship between sleep and PTSD and have clinical implications for treatment strategies.
Key numbers
5.801 points
Decrease in Symptoms
1-hour increase in total sleep time (TST) associated with reduced symptoms.
41
Sample Size
Total number of participants completing the study.
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