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. 2023 Nov;64(11):1545-1554.
doi: 10.1111/jcpp.13843. Epub 2023 May 29.

Corticostriatal connectivity mediates the reciprocal relationship between parent-reported sleep duration and impulsivity in early adolescents

Fan Nils Yang  1   2 , Tina Tong Liu  3 , Ze Wang  1
Affiliations

Corticostriatal connectivity mediates the reciprocal relationship between parent-reported sleep duration and impulsivity in early adolescents

Fan Nils Yang et al. J Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2023 Nov.

Abstract

Background: Adolescence, a developmental period characterized by significant changes in sleep, is associated with normative increases in impulsivity. While short sleep duration has been linked to elevated impulsivity, the neural mechanism underlying the relationship between short sleep duration and elevated impulsivity remains poorly understood.

Methods: We analyzed a dataset of 7,884 drug-naive 9-10 year-olds from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study. Among them, 5,166 have two-year follow-up neuroimaging data. Linear mixed-effects models, mediation analyses, and longitudinal mediation analyses were used to investigate the relationship between parent-reported sleep duration, impulsivity, and functional and structural connectivity between the cortex and the striatum.

Results: We found that less sleep duration is significantly associated with higher positive and negative urgency, which are two affect-related components of impulsivity. In addition, we observed a link between short sleep duration and reduced corticostriatal connectivity. Neural pathways associated with short sleep duration-functional connectivity between the cingulo-opercular network and the left caudate, and between the cingulo-parietal network and the right pallidum-mediated the association between sleep duration and positive urgency both at baseline and two-year follow-up. Longitudinal mediation analyses further revealed that short sleep duration and elevated positive urgency exacerbated each other through these two corticostriatal connectivities.

Conclusions: These findings highlight the key role of corticostriatal connectivities in the reciprocal relationship between short sleep duration and elevated impulsivity. Given the increasing prevalence of short sleep duration in adolescents, the link between sleep duration, impulsivity, and corticostriatal connectivities has important implications for timely interventions to address impulsive problems in early adolescents.

Keywords: Sleep; adolescents; brain imaging; development; impulsivity.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of interest statement: No conflicts declared.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.. The relationship between sleep duration and impulsivity/brain connectivity at baseline.
(A) The strength of the relationship between sleep duration and measures of impulsivity. (B) The strength of the relationship between sleep duration and both structural connectivity (blue) and functional connectivity (green). (C) Visualization of nodes in the cingulo-opercular network (red) and left caudate (blue). (D) Visualization of nodes in the cingulo-parietal network (red) and right pallidum (green). Significance levels are denoted by asterisks, where * denotes p < 0.05; ** denotes p < 0.01, *** denotes p < 0.001. cerc: cingulo-opercular network; cdelh: left caudate; copa: cingulo-parietal network; plrh: right pallidum.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.. At baseline, corticostriatal functional connectivity measures mediated the relationship between sleep duration and impulsivity.
(A) Diagram of the mediation models. (B) Mediation effects of cerc-cdelh on the associations between sleep duration and positive and negative urgency. (C) Diagram of the mediation models. (D) Mediation effects of copa-prlh on the associations between sleep duration and ugency. Note: * denotes p < 0.05; *** denotes p < 0.001; cerc-cdelh: functional connectivity between cingulo-opercular network and left caudate; copa-plrh: functional connectivity between cingulo-parietal network and right pallidum.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.. At two-year follow-up, corticostriatal functional connectivity measures mediated the relationship between sleep duration and impulsivity.
(A) Diagram of the mediation models. (B) Mediation effects of cerc-cdelh on the associations between sleep duration and positive and negative urgency. (C) Diagram of the mediation models. (D) Mediation effects of copa-prlh on the associations between sleep duration and ugencies. Note: * denotes p < 0.05; *** denotes p < 0.001; cerc-cdelh: functional connectivity between cingulo-opercular network and left caudate; copa-plrh: functional connectivity between cingulo-parietal network and right pallidum.
Figure 4.
Figure 4.. Longitudinal mediation analysis revealed corticostriatal functional connectivity measures mediated the reciprocal relationship between sleep duration and impulsivity.
(A) Diagram of the longitudinal mediation models: the independent variable is sleep duration at baseline, mediators are two functional connectivity measurements at baseline, the dependent variable is positive urgency at FL2. (B) Mediation effects of cerc-cdelh or copa-plrh on the associations between sleep duration and positive urgency at FL2. (C) Diagram of the longitudinal mediation models: the independent variable is positive urgency at baseline, mediators are two functional connectivity measurements at baseline, the dependent variable is sleep duration at FL2. (D) Mediation effects of cerc-cdelh or copa-plrh on the associations between positive urgency and sleep duration at FL2. Note: * denotes p < 0.05; ** denotes p < 0.01, *** denotes p < 0.001; cerc-cdelh: functional connectivity between cingulo-opercular network and left caudate; copa-plrh: functional connectivity between cingulo-parietal network and right pallidum.
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