More than just sleeping in: a late timing of sleep is associated with health problems and unhealthy behaviours in adolescents

Dec 15, 2018Sleep medicine

Late sleep times are linked to health problems and unhealthy behaviors in teenagers

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Circadian Biology on OpenScience ↗PubMed ↗DOI ↗

Abstract

The average chronotype for boys was 4:11 a.m. and for girls was 4:10 a.m.

Each 1-hour delay in chronotype was associated with increased occurrences of headaches, stomach aches, and back aches in boys and girls.
Girls with a later chronotype reported higher instances of dizziness and worse self-rated health.
A delayed chronotype correlated with higher daily soft drink consumption and smoking rates in both boys and girls.
Boys with a later chronotype consumed fewer vegetables, while girls consumed more energy drinks.
A later chronotype was linked to increased screen time by approximately 0.64 hours in boys and 0.74 hours in girls.

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OBJECTIVE: New research suggests that the timing of sleep, or chronotype, affects the mental well-being of adolescents, however evidence of its links to physical health is limited. We investigated the associations between chronotype and various health outcomes and behaviours in a national sample of Canadian adolescents.

METHODS: Data were from the 2014 Canadian Health Behaviour in School-Aged Children survey (29,470 students; ages 10-18). Chronotype was estimated using the midpoint of sleep on weekends, corrected for catch-up sleep. We tested the associations with physical health (headache, stomach ache, back ache, dizziness, overweight, self-rated health) and health behaviours (consumption of fruits, vegetables, sweets, soft drinks, and energy drinks, smoking, physical activity, screen time) using random-effects regressions adjusted for sleep duration and individual, family, and school characteristics.

RESULTS: The average chronotype was 4:11 a.m. for boys and 4:10 for girls. Each 1-h delay in chronotype was associated with more headaches, stomach aches, and back aches [proportional odds ratios (PropORs) 1.08, 1.08, 1.07, respectively (boys), 1.10, 1.10, 1.08, respectively (girls)], and dizziness and worse self-rated health in girls (PropORs 1.10 and 1.09, respectively), but not overweight. A 1-h delay in chronotype also related to daily soft drink consumption [ORs 1.17 (boys), 1.11 (girls)], smoking [ORs 1.23 (boys), 1.37 (girls)], screen time [additional 0.64 h (boys), 0.74 h (girls)], less vegetable consumption in boys (OR 0.96), and daily energy drink consumption in girls (OR 1.42).

CONCLUSION: A later chronotype related to worse physical health and unhealthy behaviours in Canadian adolescents. Studies are needed to clarify the underlying mechanisms.

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More than just sleeping in: a late timing of sleep is associated with health problems and unhealthy behaviours in adolescents

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