An actigraphic study of the sleep patterns of younger and older school-age children

Publication date: Available online 10 April 2018
Source:Sleep Medicine
Author(s): Reut Gruber, Gail Somerville, Samantha Wells, Deniz Keskinel, Jose Arturo Santisteban
ObjectiveSleep is viewed as being relatively consistent across the school-age period (6–13 years of age), but this has not been empirically supported. The objective of this study was to document the duration, schedule, variability, and week versus weekend discrepancies of sleep in three distinct age groups within the school-age period.MethodsParticipants were divided by age: Cycle 1, 6 and 7 years; Cycle 2, 8 and 9 years; and Cycle 3, 10 and 11 years. For seven consecutive nights, sleep was assessed in the home environment using an actigraph.ResultsCompared to children of Cycle 1, those of Cycles 2 and 3 showed increasing and significant delays in sleep start time, increasingly shorter assumed and actual sleep durations, and larger night-to-night variability of sleep. Of the children in Cycles 1, 2, and 3, 96%, 87.7%, and 51.3%, respectively, were found to spend the recommended 9–11 h in bed. However, the actigraphic 'true sleep' measure revealed that only 17%, 7%, and 2.5% of these children, respectively, obtained the recommended amount of sleep.ConclusionSleep duration, schedule, and variability change significantly across the school-age period.



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