Sleeping perfectly? Trait perfectionism, perceived stress, and sleep quality

Abstract

The aims of our study were to test the role of stress in explaining the links between multidimensional perfectionism and sleep quality and to replicate our findings with two distinct samples and two different measures of perfectionism. Sample 1 included 335 Canadian undergraduate students (n = 276 women, Mage = 21.7 years, SD = 4.9) who completed surveys assessing perfectionism via the Almost Perfect Scale-Revised, perceived stress, and sleep quality. Sample 2 included 296 American adults recruited from MTurk (n = 141 women, Mage = 34.8 years, SD = 9.8) who completed surveys measuring multidimensional perfectionism with the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale, perceived stress, and sleep quality. Path analyses in both samples indicated that PS was related to better sleep via lower levels of stress whereas PC was associated with poorer sleep via higher levels of stress. There was no support for treating stress as a moderating factor of the association between perfectionism and sleep. Our findings substantiate that from a multidimensional perspective, trait perfectionism is both positively and negatively associated with sleep and further underscores the value of examining the role of perceived stress in understanding how multidimensional trait perfectionism contributes to sleep.