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
. 2022 Jul;78(7):1516-1539.
doi: 10.1002/jclp.23323. Epub 2022 Feb 12.

Sleep and chronotype in adults with persistent tic disorders

Emily J Ricketts  1 , Gabrielle E Montalbano  1 , Helen J Burgess  2 , Dana L McMakin  3   4 , Meredith E Coles  5 , John Piacentini  1 , Christopher S Colwell  1
Affiliations

Sleep and chronotype in adults with persistent tic disorders

Emily J Ricketts et al. J Clin Psychol. 2022 Jul.

Abstract

Objective: This study examined sleep disorders and sleep medication use rates, nighttime tics, and sleep and chronotype in relation to tic and co-occurring symptoms in adults with persistent tic disorders (PTDs), including Tourette's disorder (TD).

Methods: One hundred twenty-five adult internet survey respondents rated sleep history, sleep, chronotype, tic severity, impairment, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, obsessive-compulsive symptoms, anxiety, depression, and emotional and behavioral dyscontrol.

Results: Bruxism, insomnia, tic-related difficulty falling asleep, and melatonin use were commonly endorsed. Sleep disturbance correlated with impairment, obsessive-compulsive symptoms, and emotional and behavioral dyscontrol. Eveningness correlated with vocal and total tic severity only in TD. Controlling for age and sex, age, impairment, and obsessive-compulsive symptoms predicted sleep disturbance, and age and tic severity predicted chronotype.

Conclusions: Impairment and obsessive-compulsive symptoms play a role in sleep disturbance in adults with PTDs, and may be intervention targets. Eveningness relates to tic severity, which may suggest the utility of interventions to advance chronotype.

Keywords: Tourette syndrome; chronotype; impairment; obsessive compulsive disorder; sleep.

PubMed Disclaimer

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

References

    1. Abramovitch A, Reese H, Woods DW, Peterson A, Deckersbach T, Piacentini J, Scahill L, & Wilhelm S (2015). Psychometric properties of a self-report instrument for the assessment of tic severity in adults with tic disorders. Behavior Therapy, 46(6), 786–796. 10.1016/j.beth.2015.06.002 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Alvaro PK, Roberts RM, & Harris JK (2013). A systematic review assessing bidirectionality between sleep disturbances, anxiety, and depression. Sleep, 36(1), 1059–1068. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Alvaro PK, Roberts RM, & Harris JK (2014). The independent relationships between insomnia, depression, subtypes of anxiety, and chronotype during adolescence. Sleep Medicine, 15(8), 934–941. 10.1016/j.sleep.2014.03.019 - DOI - PubMed
    1. American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (5th ed.). Arlington, VA: American Psychiatric Publishing. 10.1176/appi.books.9780890425596.dsm05 - DOI
    1. Andersen LPH, Gögenur I, Rosenberg J, & Reiter RJ (2016). The safety of melatonin in humans. Clinical Drug Investigation, 36(36), 169–175. 10.1007/s40261-015-0368-5 - DOI - PubMed

Publication types