Sleep-amount differentially affects fear-processing neural circuitry in pediatric anxiety: A preliminary fMRI investigation.

Insufficient sleep, as well as the incidence of anxiety disorders, both peak during adolescence. While both conditions present perturbations in fear-processing-related neurocircuitry, it is unknown whether these neurofunctional alterations directly link anxiety and compromised sleep in adolescents. Fourteen anxious adolescents (AAs) and 19 healthy adolescents (HAs) were compared on a measure of sleep amount and neural responses to negatively valenced faces during fMRI. Group differences in neural response to negative faces emerged in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and the hippocampus. In both regions, correlation of sleep amount with BOLD activation was positive in AAs, but negative in HAs. Follow-up psychophysiological interaction (PPI) analyses indicated positive connectivity between dACC and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, and between hippocampus and insula. This connectivity was correlated negatively with sleep amount in AAs, but positively in HAs. In conclusion, the presence of clinical anxiety modulated the effects of sleep-amount on neural reactivity to negative faces differently among this group of adolescents, which may contribute to different clinical significance and outcomes of sleep disturbances in healthy adolescents and patients with anxiety disorders

#Sleepyteens: social media use in adolescence is associated with poor sleep quality, anxiety, depression and low self-esteem

This study examined how social media use related to sleep quality, self-esteem, anxiety and depression in 467 Scottish adolescents. We measured overall social media use, nighttime-specific social media use, emotional investment in social media, sleep quality, self-esteem and levels of anxiety and depression. Adolescents who used social media more – both overall and at night – and those who were more emotionally invested in social media experienced poorer sleep quality, lower self-esteem and higher levels of anxiety and depression. Nighttime-specific social media use predicted poorer sleep quality after controlling for anxiety, depression and self-esteem. These findings contribute to the growing body of evidence that social media use is related to various aspects of wellbeing in adolescents. In addition, our results indicate that nighttime-specific social media use and emotional investment in social media are two important factors that merit further investigation in relation to adolescent sleep and wellbeing

Adolescent sleep and the foundations of prefrontal cortical development and dysfunction

Modern life poses many threats to good-quality sleep, challenging brain health across the lifespan. Curtailed or fragmented sleep may be particularly damaging during adolescence, when sleep disruption by delayed chro-notypes and societal pressures coincides with our brains preparing for adult life via intense refinement of neural connectivity. These vulnerabilities converge on the prefrontal cortex, one of the last brain regions to mature and a central hub of the limbic-cortical circuits underpinning decision-making, reward processing, social interactions and emotion. Even subtle disruption of prefrontal cortical development during adolescence may therefore have enduring impact. In this review, we integrate synaptic and circuit mechanisms, glial biology, sleep neurophys-iology and epidemiology, to frame a hypothesis highlighting the implications of adolescent sleep disruption for the neural circuitry of the prefrontal cortex. Convergent evidence underscores the importance of acknowledging, quantifying and optimizing adolescent sleep's contributions to normative brain development and to lifelong mental health

The Foundations of Lifelong Health Are Built in Early Childhood

Explains the need to design early childhood policies and programs to provide stable and responsive relationships; safe and supportive physical, chemical, and built environments; and sound nutrition for lifelong health promotion and disease prevention

Consistency of Sleep Across Development and Relations to Executive Functions; Applications to Emerging Adults Transitioning to College and Adolescents with Spina Bifida

College Students, Development, Executive Functioning, Inhibition, Sleep consistency, Spina Bifid

Risk-Taking Behaviors and Impulsivity in Emerging Adults Born Prematurely

Recently there has been an increase in research focusing on the role of sleep in psychological disorders in adolescents and young adults due to both increases in risk-taking behaviors and continued brain development during this period. Therefore, the objective of the current study was to extend findings of a master’s thesis suggesting a relationship between subjective and objective measures of sleep and externalizing disorders in young adults in a community setting to a vulnerable population (i.e., emerging adults born prematurely). Measures include sleep behavior (Actigraphy, PSQI), birth status, objective measures of impulsivity and risk-taking (CPT-II, BART, Eye-Tracking), and subjective measures of both internalizing and externalizing disorder traits (TriPM, BIS 11, PAI scales, BPS). A total of 227 participants completed the study, including 71 men (premature n = 32) and 156 women (premature n = 103). Participants in the sample showed high average percentages of sleep (M = 91.91%) and few participants reported clinically elevated scores on the measures (≤ 13.45%), as would be expected. Results extend previous findings that both externalizing (i.e., psychopathy as measured by the TriPM) and internalizing (i.e., depression as measured by the PAI) traits decrease subjective sleep quality (i.e., PSQI scores). Results show that on average women born prematurely report increased internalizing traits compared with full term women and men born preterm or full term; while men born prematurely report lower levels of antisocial traits and behaviors (i.e., more female typical) when compared to full term men but still higher levels compared to women born preterm or full term. Results further suggest that premature birth status is associated with significantly lower rates of antisocial traits, particularly when severity of premature birth increases (i.e., fewer weeks of gestation). The community population and birth status is often not of focus in sleep research with the exception of sleep disordered breathing, and thus findings add to our understanding of this vulnerable population in emerging adults born prematurely who are attending college