Poor Sleep Quality is Associated with Decreased Emotional Arousal in Healthy Girls

Abstract

A growing number of studies in adults document critical relationships between sleep and emotional processing based on responses to affective images from the International Affective Picture System (IAPS; Lang, Bradley, & Cuthbert, 2005). Our aim was to extend examination of the interrelationships between sleep and emotional processing to a sample of healthy girls, ages 10 to 16 years. A total of 86 girls (M = 12.88 years, SD = 1.92) without psychiatric disorders were recruited. In addition to structured diagnostic interviews, report of sleep quality was examined in relation to valence and arousal ratings of pleasant, neutral and unpleasant IAPS images. Overall, picture ratings were consistent with findings from previous research showing pleasant images to produce high arousal and valence ratings in childhood and that these relationships decrease with age. Regression models revealed poor sleep quality to be associated with decreased subjective arousal in response to negative/unpleasant images, but not pleasant or neutral images. Findings are discussed in terms of a need for more research aimed at better elucidating how sleep quality during the childhood years relates to the processing of emotional information.