A new study finds that the exposure to real-life violence can measurably impact a child’s sleep and the effects can last over time. The findings, presented at the SLEEP 2012 meeting in Boston last week, show how the severity of a violent event affects a child’s quality and quantity of sleep . The more severe the violence, the more sleep is impacted.
While trouble with nightmares and insomnia has long been associated with exposure to violence, the study, conducted by researchers from Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Clinic Multidisciplinary Research Training Program, found that characteristics of the violent act touch different aspects of the child’s sleep.
For example, children who are victimized during a violent event tend to sleep less and more poorly than children who witnessed a violent event but were not victimized. Children who witness a homicide have more inconsistent sleep as time passes since the violent event occurred.
"Violence permeates our society, and this work is showing that experiencing even a single violent event as a victim or as a witness may influence sleep behavior in different ways, which in turn may negatively affect a child’s health and functioning," said James Spilsbury, PhD, the study’s principal investigator.
The researchers measured the sleep of 46 children, ages 8 to 16, who were participating in a social service program for children exposed to violence. Ethnicity was mixed, but the children were largely disadvantaged and living in urban settings.
Sleep data were collected for 7 days by actigraphy to measure activity during the day and at night. Follow-up was conducted 3 months later. In analyzing the results, the researchers controlled for such factors as age, sex, family income, and exposure to violence in the previous year.
"Even after controlling for the possible effects of exposure to violence in the previous year, we saw that the severity of the more recent event had a measurable, negative influence on a child’s quantity and quality of sleep," Spilsbury said.
