Sleepiness as a Pathway Linking Race and Socioeconomic Status with Children's Academic and Cognitive Outcomes

• In Event: 2-089 - Sleep and Cognition from Infancy to Middle Childhood: The Role of Socioeconomic Factors

Integrative Statement

Black/African American (AA) children and children from families of lower socioeconomic status (SES) are at increased risk for short sleep duration, poor sleep quality, and greater daytime sleepiness relative to White/European American (EA) and higher SES children (El-Sheikh et al., 2013; Jarrin et al., 2014). Poor sleep, in turn, predicts lower academic achievement and intellectual ability (Buckhalt et al., 2009). AA and lower SES children are also at greater risk for lower academic and cognitive performance (Lawson & Farah, 2017). Sleep/wake behaviors may contribute to racial and socioeconomic disparities in children’s adaptation. Supporting this idea, work with adults has found short sleep duration and poor sleep quality to act as pathways underlying racial and socioeconomic health disparities (Moore et al., 2002; Tomfohr et al., 2016). The present study examined self-reported sleepiness as an intervening (Shrout & Bolger, 2002) or mediating variable linking race and SES to academic and cognitive performance among children. Sleepiness has particularly negative effects on school performance compared to sleep duration or quality (Dewald et al., 2014), perhaps because of its direct connection to attention and concentration (Heijden et al., 2017). To our knowledge, no prior study has examined sleepiness in this context.
Children (N = 282, 52% boys) participated when they were 9 and 11 years old. The sample was 65% EA and 35% AA and the majority of the children (63%) were living at or below the poverty line. At 9 years, children reported on their daytime sleepiness via the well-established Sleep Habits Survey (Wolfson & Carskadon, 1998). A multi-method approach was used to assess academic and cognitive outcomes at both ages 9 and 11 and included teachers' report of academic functioning on the Student Behavior Survey (Lachar et al., 2000), cognitive performance scores on the Woodcock-Johnson Tests of Cognitive Abilities (Woodcock et al., 2001) and state standardized test scores obtained from schools. Path analyses analyzed whether sleepiness at age 9 was an intervening or mediating variable linking race or SES with change in academic and cognitive outcomes from age 9 to age 11. Toward rigorous assessment of our research questions, several potential confounds (e.g., whether the child had an ADHD diagnosis, n = 37) were covaried in analyses.
Results indicated that sleepiness functioned as an intervening variable between both race and SES and change in all outcome variables (Table 1). AA and lower SES children reported greater sleepiness, which in turn predicted lower academic functioning, cognitive performance, and standardized test scores. Race was a stronger predictor of sleepiness than SES when both were entered into the same model (Figure 1).
These novel longitudinal findings, based on a sample of children underrepresented in the literature, implicate sleepiness as a pathway of effects in associations between race and SES and key developmental outcomes. The pronounced effects for AA children may suggest that race-based stressors confronted by children of color, such as stereotype threat and discrimination, compromise their sleep and increase daytime sleepiness. Psychoeducation regarding the sleep environment and hygiene may be beneficial for improving achievement.

Authors

• Mina Shimizu, Auburn University
  Presenting Author

• Lauren Philbrook, Colgate University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Joseph A Buckhalt, Auburn University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Mona El-Sheikh, Auburn University
  Non-Presenting Author