Economic adversity and children's sleep problems: multiple indicators and moderation of effects

Abstract

Objective: Toward explicating relations between economic adversity and children's sleep, we examined associations between multiple indicators of socioeconomic status (SES)/adversity and children's objectively and subjectively derived sleep parameters; ethnicity was examined as potential moderator.

Methods: Participants were 276 third- and fourth-grade children and their families (133 girls; M age = 9.44 years; SD = .71): 66% European American (EA) and 34% African American (AA). Four SES indicators were used: income-to-needs ratio, perceived economic well-being, maternal education, and community poverty. Children wore actigraphs for 7 nights and completed a self-report measure to assess sleep problems.

Results: Objectively and subjectively assessed sleep parameters were related to different SES indicators, and overall worse sleep was evident for children from lower SES homes. Specifically, children from homes with lower income-to-needs ratios had higher levels of reported sleep/wake problems. Parental perceived economic well-being was associated with shorter sleep minutes and greater variability in sleep onset for children. Lower mother's education was associated with lower sleep efficiency. Children who attended Title 1 schools had shorter sleep minutes. Ethnicity was a significant moderator of effects in the link between some SES indicators and children's sleep. AA children's sleep was more negatively affected by income-to-needs ratio and mother's education than was the sleep of EA children.

Conclusions: The results advocate for the importance of specifying particular SES and sleep variables used because they may affect the ability to detect associations between sleep and economic adversity.

Figure 1

Fitted path model of sleep minutes, sleep efficiency, sleep variability, and sleep/wake problems regressed on income-to-needs ratio and controlled for single-parent household, child age, medications, and asthma. Significant multiple group estimates for EA and AA children representing the moderation by ethnicity are presented following the main effects parameter estimates. Nonstandardized parameter estimates are depicted with estimated correlations in parentheses. ^~p < .10. *p < .05. **p < .01.

Figure 2

Fitted path model of sleep minutes, sleep efficiency, sleep variability, and sleep/wake problems regressed on the latent construct, economic well-being, and controlled for single-parent household, child age, medications, and asthma. Nonstandardized parameter estimates are depicted with estimated correlations in parentheses. ^~p < .10. *p < .05. **p < .01.

Figure 3

Fitted path model of sleep minutes, sleep efficiency, sleep variability, and sleep/wake problems regressed on mother’s education and controlled for single-parent household, child age, medications, and asthma. Significant multiple group estimates for EA and AA children representing the moderation by ethnicity are presented following the main effects parameter estimates. Nonstandardized parameter estimates are depicted with estimated correlations in parentheses. ^~ p < .10. *p < .05. **p < .01.

Figure 4

Fitted path model of sleep minutes, sleep efficiency, sleep variability, and sleep/wake problems regressed on the latent construct, economic well-being, and controlled for single-parent household, child age, medications, and asthma. Nonstandardized parameter estimates are depicted with estimated correlations in parentheses. ^~ p < .10. *p < .05. **p < .01.