Can measures of sleep quality or white matter structural integrity predict level of worry or rumination in adolescents facing stressful situations? Lessons from the COVID‐19 pandemic

Abstract

Introduction COVID-19 has resulted in major life changes to the majority of the world population, particularly adolescents, with social-distancing measures such as home-based schooling likely to impact sleep quality. Increased worry is also likely considering the substantial financial, educational and health concerns accompanying COVID-19. White matter (WM) integrity has been shown to be associated with anxiety and depression symptoms, including worry, as well being closely associated with sleep quality. This study aimed to investigate the associations between pre-COVID sleep quality, WM structural integrity and levels of worry and rumination about COVID. Methods N = 30 adolescent participants from Queensland, Australia, completed diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) scanning pre-COVID, the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) pre and during COVID, and 9 items designed to measure 3 constructs, perceived impact of COVID, general worry, and COVID-specific worry and rumination. Results Sleep quality (PSQI total) was significantly poorer during COVID compared with pre-COVID. Sleep onset latency measured pre-COVID was significantly associated with COVID-specific worry and rumination. While the structural integrity of a number of WM tracts (measured pre-COVID) were found to be significantly associated with COVID-specific worry and rumination. Follow-up regression analysis using a model including pre-COVID sleep onset latency, structural integrity of the posterior limb of the internal capsule (PLIC), gender and change in PSQI explained a significant 47% of the variance in COVID-specific worry and rumination. Conclusions These findings suggest that adolescents with poor sleep quality and perturbed WM integrity may be at risk of heightened reactivity to future stressful events and interventions should focus on improving sleep onset latency.

Subjective sleep alterations in healthy subjects worldwide during COVID-19 pandemic: A systematic review, meta-analysis and meta-regression

“…Regarding the administered sleep measures, 103 studies reported PSQI scores. Specifically, 100 reported PSQI global scores [ [37] , [38] , [39] , [40] , 42 , 43 , 45 ], [ 46 , [48] , [49] , [50] , [51] , [52] , [53] ], [ [55] , [56] , [57] , [58] , [59] , [60] , [61] , [62] , [63] , [65] , [66] , [67] , [68] ], [ [70] , [71] , [72] , [73] , 75 , [77] , [78] , [79] , [80] , [81] , [82] , [83] , [84] , 86 , 87 ], [ [91] , [92] , [93] , [94] , [96] , [97] , [98] , 102 , 103 , [106] , [107] , [108] , [109] , [110] ], [ [113] , [114] , [115] , [116] , 119 , 120 , [122] , [123] , [124] , [...…”

Mental Health and Wellbeing in Young People in the UK during Lockdown (COVID-19)

“…There is now gathering evidence that a number of different facets of mental wellbeing have suffered during the time of lockdowns across the globe, including but not limited to anxiety, depression, worry and rumination, stress, wellbeing and sleep [7][8][9][10][11][12][13]. For example, early on in the course of the pandemic (May 2020), initial studies in the U.S. found psychological distress levels for the previous month as high as those estimated for the previous year [14].…”

Cross-cultural validation of the Worries about COVID-19 and its consequences Scale (W-COV) in adolescents and young people

“…Most of the research has been conducted in general adult population above 18 years old (e. g. Boyraz et al, 2020 ; Ho et al, 2005 ; Moore & Lucas, 2020 ), while only a few studies have been carried out with particularly vulnerable populations (e.g., Maxfield & Pituch, 2020 ), healthcare workers (e.g., Puci et al, 2020 ) and people with chronically diseases (e.g., Joensen et al, 2020 ). There are some recent studies that have examined worries about COVID in adolescents (e.g., Jamieson et al, 2021 ; Lessard & Puhl, 2021 ; Vogel et al, 2021 ) and young people (e.g., Lehmann et al, 2021 ; Shukla et al, 2021 ; Yıldırım et al, 2020 ), stressing that concerns about the pandemic have a considerable impact on the negative affectivity of adolescents and young adults.…”