Less Sleep Associated With Anxiety- and Depression-Like Thinking

Sleeping less than the recommended 8 hours a night may be associated with thoughts similar to those seen in anxiety and depression, according to the results of a recent study.

Repetitive negative thinking has been shown to be associated with disruptions in sleep, and these disruptions could, in turn, be associated with attentional control deficits.
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For their study, researchers enrolled 52 adults with high levels of transdiagnostic RNT and varying sleep durations to participate in a free-viewing and directed attention task using emotionally-evocative and neutral image. Eye-tracking data were collected during the study, as were self-reported and clinician-administered sleep interviews. 

Overall, they found that shorter habitual sleep duration was associated with a longer duration of looking at emotionally negative images, compared with neutral images, as well as more difficulty disengaging attention from negative images during a directed attention task. Longer sleep onset latencies were also shown to be associated with difficulty disengaging from negative images.

“These findings suggest that sleep disruption may be associated with a specific impact on cognitive resources that are necessary for the top-down inhibitory control of attention to emotionally negative information,” the researchers wrote.

However, they noted that a causal link between sleep and attentional control could not be inferred from these cross-sectional data.

—Michael Potts

Reference:

Nota JA, Coles ME. Shorter sleep duration and longer sleep onset latency are related to difficulty disengaging attention from negative emotional images in individuals with elevated transdiagnostic repetitive negative thinking. J Behav Ther Exp Psychiatry. 2018;58:114-122.