Sufficient, high quality sleep is essential for mental focus, efficient cognitive functioning, and the maintenance of physical health. Widespread sleep problems and insufficient sleep duration across the college years is therefore a pressing public health concern that could also limit the economic and health benefits of higher education. Furthermore, disparities in sleep between Black and White adults is an extremely concerning social issue that inevitably serves to perpetuate ongoing group differences in socioeconomic attainment and health across the life span. Significant gaps in the science of sleep and sleep disparities among college students include inadequate attention to mechanisms for effects of childhood adversity or current stress, an absence of studies utilizing objective measurements of sleep, and a lack of longitudinal research examining whether racial disparities in sleep are present or widen across the college years. Utilizing a rigorous longitudinal design, this study will significantly advance extant scientific understanding by examining how childhood adversity and contemporaneous stress combine to influence sleep and sleep disparities among college students. The degree to which behavioral factors salient in the college context (e.g., napping, bedtime variability, substance use) operate as mediators of stress-sleep links will also be examined to enhance mechanistic understanding and illuminate likely loci of intervention. The proposed sample of 240 first and second year students (50% Black, 50% female, ages 18-21) will be assessed across two time points, one year apart. Assessments of childhood adversity and contemporaneous stress will be more comprehensive than in any prior study examining determinants of sleep. Childhood adversity assessments will include established measures of adverse childhood experiences, family socioeconomic risk, and objective indicators of neighborhood and school disadvantage. Contemporaneous stress assessments will include established measures of daily hassles (academic and social), stressful life events, experiences of discrimination, campus racial climate, and chronic vigilance to unfair treatment. Sleep assessments will be multi-faceted, including both actigraphy and self-report measures. Activity monitors, worn on the non-dominant wrist for seven consecutive days will be used to assess total sleep time, sleep efficiency (% of time in bed asleep), time spent awake after sleep onset, and variability in bedtime and total sleep time. This study will be the first to examine whether racial disparities in objectively measured sleep characteristics are present or widen across the college years. Findings will add critical evidence on determinants of student sleep and sleep disparities, the implications of which are of high importance for enhancing the economic and health benefits of higher education, and addressing enduring racial disparities in health and wealth. Overall, the rigorous and comprehensive methods employed?alongside novel and significant research questions?allow for unprecedented opportunities to advance understanding of sleep and sleep disparities among college students, and illuminate vital targets for intervention.
Many college students experience insufficient and poor quality sleep, which can impair mental and physical health, hinder academic achievement, and limit the overall benefits of higher education. Racial disparities in sleep between Black and White Americans is also an extremely concerning social problem that serves to perpetuate ongoing group differences in achievement, socioeconomic attainment, and health across the life span. This study will examine, among college students, how childhood adversity and contemporaneous stress come together to influence sleep patterns and the development of racial sleep disparities.
