Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2021 Jul 1;17(7):1371-1377.
doi: 10.5664/jcsm.9196.

COVID-19 pandemic impact on sleep habits, chronotype, and health-related quality of life among high school students: a longitudinal study

Felipe Dias Genta  1 , Guilherme Brito Rodrigues Neto  1 , João Pedro Velletri Sunfeld  1 , João Fabio Porto  1 , Andressa Dallago Xavier  1 , Claudia R C Moreno  2 , Geraldo Lorenzi-Filho  3 , Pedro Rodrigues Genta  3
Affiliations

COVID-19 pandemic impact on sleep habits, chronotype, and health-related quality of life among high school students: a longitudinal study

Felipe Dias Genta et al. J Clin Sleep Med. .

Abstract

Study objectives: The COVID-19 pandemic has challenged the population of affected areas in multiple dimensions. Adolescents have been especially affected with school closure and home confinement. The impact of the pandemic on sleep habits and quality of sleep and quality of life among adolescents has not been adequately characterized. We hypothesized that the COVID-19 pandemic has induced an evening shift of the daily rhythm among adolescents and adversely affected sleep quality and quality of life of high school students.

Methods: Students were questioned about their usual bed and wake-up times and answered the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index Questionnaire, the Epworth Sleepiness Scale, the Horne-Osteberg Morningness-Eveningness Questionnaire, and the World Health Organization Quality of Life Questionnaire-abbreviated version before and during the pandemic.

Results: Ninety-four students (64% females, aged 15 ± 1 years) participated in both phases of the study. Students delayed bed and wake-up times by 1.5 (0.5-2.0) and 2.0 (1.5-2.5) hours, respectively. Chronotype (per the Morningness-Eveningness Questionnaire) shifted toward eveningness during the pandemic. Sleep duration increased and quality of sleep (per the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index) improved only among those students with shorter sleep duration before the pandemic. During the pandemic, the physical and psychological domains of the World Health Organization Quality of Life Questionnaire worsened but the environmental domain improved as compared with the study before the pandemic.

Conclusions: High school students have delayed bed and wake-up times and shifted chronotype toward eveningness during the COVID-19 pandemic. The worsening of the physical and psychological World Health Organization Quality of Life Questionnaire domains and improvement in the environmental domain highlight the conflicting experiences that high school students are facing during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Keywords: COVID-19; adolescents; chronotype; quality of life; social jet lag.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

All authors have seen and approved the manuscript. Dr. Genta was supported by the National Council of Scientific and Technological Development (313348/2017-0) and the São Paulo Research Foundation (2018/20612-4). The authors report no conflicts of interest.

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Azizi A, Achak D, Aboudi K, et al. . Health-related quality of life and behavior-related lifestyle changes due to the COVID-19 home confinement: dataset from a Moroccan sample. Data Brief. 2020;32:106239. 10.1016/j.dib.2020.106239 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Riiser K, Helseth S, Haraldstad K, Torbjørnsen A, Richardsen KR. Adolescents’ health literacy, health protective measures, and health-related quality of life during the Covid-19 pandemic. PLoS One. 2020;15(8):e0238161. 10.1371/journal.pone.0238161 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Cellini N, Canale N, Mioni G, Costa S. Changes in sleep pattern, sense of time and digital media use during COVID-19 lockdown in Italy. J Sleep Res. 2020;29(4):e13074. 10.1111/jsr.13074 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Laberge L, Petit D, Simard C, Vitaro F, Tremblay RE, Montplaisir J. Development of sleep patterns in early adolescence. J Sleep Res. 2001;10(1):59–67. 10.1046/j.1365-2869.2001.00242.x - DOI - PubMed
    1. Cain N, Gradisar M. Electronic media use and sleep in school-aged children and adolescents: a review. Sleep Med. 2010;11(8):735–742. 10.1016/j.sleep.2010.02.006 - DOI - PubMed