Changes in Sleep from Adolescence to Young Adulthood: Recent Research

Introduction

The many changes endured by those going through the transitions of adolescence to young adulthood are not isolated to entirely obvious behavioral changes. Sleep undergoes change during this time as well. The changes in sleep are often unnoticed and taken for granted, but sleep is an activity which will take up a third of our life. It is also important to our health and thus needs to be investigated.

Effects of Cognitive and Biological Development on Sleep

Several longitudinal and cross-sectional studies on children from ages 3-15 indicate that all children dream (Murray 1995). Dreams change as the child ages and attains more cognitive development. Dreams tend to lengthen and become more complex as the child ages. They tend to reflect the maturation of the child's thoughts, feelings, and growing of self-awareness. In adolescence, the dreams children have are better organized and more complex than those in the previous age group. The previous age group, elementary age 6-12, children have dreams with action and a story-line. Authority figures such as a bus driver, teacher, or police officer play an important role in the dreams of children in this age group. Adolescent's dreams, on the other hand, approach the adult dream patterns. Peers play a lead role in their mostly pleasant dreams. There are interesting changes in the amount of REM sleep, sleep in which most dreams are most often reported, from newborn to old age. Newborns have REM sleep 50% of the time, adolescents 18.5% of the time, 25% of the time for 20 year olds, and between 13% and !8% in old age. These changes in sleep reflect underlying developmental changes. More research is necessary in this area to discover what drives these changes.

Researchers studied boys and girls between the ages of 11-13 at different stages of puberty in a study done by Carskadon et al. (1995). The researchers had the children establish their own sleep schedules, then would prescribe a sleep schedule. The goal of these schedules was to ultimately have the children's bodies choose their natural sleep schedule uninfluenced by family, school, friends, or daylight. Saliva samples were taken from the children during the wakeful hours to measure the levels of melatonin which is a hormone linked to the regulation of sleep. They found that puberty affects sleep in that it creates the pattern of sleeping late and rising late in the day. Psychosocial factors such as academics and peer pressure do not significantly affect sleep as it has been traditionally thought. Puberty may be the cause of the change in sleep. Further research is being done in this are by the same researchers to determine how puberty affects sleep.

Effects of Life Structure and Personality on Sleep

Park et al. (1997) gave the Morningness-Eveningness Questionnaire and Life-Habits Inventory to three groups: Japanese college students, Korean college students, and Japanese workers. The purpose of their study was to show the differences between Morning and Evening types between these groups which can be attributed to differences in daily life patterns and economic and social conditions. The results showed that Japanese workers were more frequently the Morning type than were either of the student groups. It was hypothesized that workers have a more restricted and regular life pattern than do students who tend to be of the Evening type. Those belonging to the Evening type tended to wake up in a bad mood and took more naps than those of the Morning type. Sleep length of Evening type students was short which resulted in higher napping frequency. The Japanese students have a less restricted life structure than Korean students because Japanese students enjoy extracurricular activities, part-time jobs, and "free time" which Korean students do not experience. This more variable and irregular life structure is typical of those classified as Evening types. It was ultimately concluded that once in an occupation, a person is bound to a stricter and earlier schedule and thus tends to be of the Morning type. College students who enjoy a more varied, irregular, and unstructured schedule tend to be of the Evening type.

Stuart McKelvie (1992) did a replication of a previous study (Hicks et al. 1979) that showed that college students who score high on Type A behavior questions sleep fewer than eight hours per night. The Jenkins Activity Survey (JAS) and a three-item Hicks et al. Sleep survey were administered to 311 undergraduate volunteers. The results confirmed Hicks et al. (1979) as those who slept fewer hours had higher JAS scores. There were 183 regular sleepers who were satisfied with their number of hours of sleep and 112 irregular sleepers/ There were also 16 subjects who gave more than one response to this survey question. Of the irregular sleepers, 64% reported fewer than eight hours of sleep. There was no significant difference in JAS scores between the irregular sleepers who got fewer than eight hours of sleep and those who slept more. It was concluded that fewer than eight hours of sleep is fairly common among college students because of their behavior pattern. It was further concluded that those who poses Type A personality study more, spend more time doing leisure activities, are more efficient, energetic, and ambitious and spend fewer hours than their peers sleeping.

Conclusion

The limited research on what affects sleep during the transition from adolescence to young adult college student has emitted some interesting findings. It seems people tend to fit the Evening type sleep pattern from the time of puberty through the college years. Though the Evening type pattern in adolescents may reflect an underlying biological change, in college students, it seems to more likely reflect a life structure and personality traits. It is interesting that there is an increase in REM sleep from the time of adolescents to the early 20's. Research in these and other areas of sleep is in needed as well as a broader subject base. Simply, more research is needed to determine the role of developmental forces behind sleep effectors.

References

Carskadon, M.A., Vleira, C., & Acebo, C. (1993). Association between puberty and delayed phase preference. Sleep , 16 (3), 258-262.

McKelvie, Stuart J. (1992). Sleep duration and self-reported type A behavior: A replication. The Journal of Psychology, 126 (3), 285-289.

Murray, John B. (1995). Children's Dreams. The Journal of Genetic Psychology,156 (3), 303-312.

Park, Young M., Seo, Yeo J., Matsumoto, K., Shinkoda, H., & Park, K. (1997). Scores on Morningness-Eveningness and sleep habits of Korean students, Japanese students, and Japanese workers. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 85, 143-154.

Contributed by Renata Meixner, December 8, 1997.

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