Mediation by Sleep of Low Resources, Adverse Childhood Experiences and Parent-Child Interactions on Child Development

• In Event: Poster Session 04
  In Poster Session: PS 04 Topic - School Readiness/Childcare

Abstract

Children exposed to adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) or poverty while growing up are more likely to exhibit delays in both cognitive and social-emotional development. Conversely, there is evidence suggesting that strong parent-child interactions buffer the impact of these early life stresses and strengthen cognitive and social-emotional development. In a study of 91 3-5 year old child-parent dyads utilizing publicly available social services to access food, housing, clothing and preschool programming for their children (35% living at or below the level qualifying for food and housing assistance), information on parent and child ACE exposure and child cognitive development, executive functioning, social-emotional development and sleep habits was collected. Parent-child interactions were scored for connection and reciprocity from a 10 min video of a play session, using the Simple Interactions scoring system. To look at the role of sleep in mediating the impact of various stresses and parent-child interactions on child outcomes mediation analyses were run. Sleep was quantified using the Child Sleep Habits Questionnaire (CSHQ) with a score greater than 41 indicating a clinically diagnosable sleep problem. The mean CSHQ score was found to be 48.09±1.03, with 77% of children in the study having significant sleep problems (i.e., a CSHQ score >41). Mediation analyses found significant models for the effects of low resources on social-emotional development (r=0.61, p<0.0001), executive function skills (r=0.59, p<0.0001), and problem-solving skills (r=0.38, p=0.002) with sleep (i.e., the CSHQ score) as a significant mediator. Similar results were found for exposure to ACEs on social-emotional development (r=0.54, p<0.0001), executive function skills (r=0.054, p<0.0001) and problem-solving skills (r=0.32, p=0.01) with sleep as a significant mediator. Likewise, mediation analysis found a significant model for the effects of reciprocity between parents and children on problem-solving skills (r=0.45, p<0.0001) with sleep as a significant mediator. The results of this study lead to several conclusions. First, no child outcomes were preferentially sensitive to the stress of low resources compared to the stress of adverse childhood experiences. Thus, the data suggests that all stresses should be considered when examining the impact of early life stress on child outcomes, including resources (i.e., income, parent education) and adversity (child ACEs and parent ACEs). All of these factors were combined into a single “Family Stress” measure as pictured, where there is a significant mediation model of Family Stress on social-emotional outcome (r=0.58, p<0.0001) with sleep as a significant mediator. Second, the fact that most of the children in our study had clinically diagnosable sleep problems in conjunction with the finding that sleep is a significant mediator of both stress and parent-child relationships, suggests that intervention programs to improve sleep may be very important strategies for preventing and treating the impact of stress on developmental outcomes.

Authors

• Emma Doenier, University of Pittsburgh
  Presenting Author

• Breanna Sullivan, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Swetha Tummala, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Julianne Wanner, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Amelia Potter, University of Calgary
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jelena Komanchuk, University of Calgary (U of C)
  Non-Presenting Author

• Bikramjit Sekhon, University of Calgary
  Non-Presenting Author

• Madison Very, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Cristina Codario, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Alexandra Miragaia, University of PIttburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Sai Bhatte, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Delaney Jones, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Allyson Letavic, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Ian Murphy, Ohio State University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jessica C Levenson, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Neal Ryan, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Nicole Letourneau, University of Calgary (U of C)
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jeanette Trauth, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author

• Judy L Cameron, University of Pittsburgh
  Non-Presenting Author