Psychological intervention

Gerontology

Demography

Early adulthood

National Health Interview Survey

Ethnic group

Literature

Operating system

Psychiatry

Developmental psychology

Computer science

Anthropology

Sleep (system call)

Psychology

Population

Sociology

Young adult

Life course approach

Medicine

Duration (music)

American Journal of Epidemiology

Racial/ethnic and sex/gender disparities in sleep duration have been documented in adolescence and adulthood. Identifying racial/ethnic and sex/gender differences in sleep duration trajectories from adolescence to adulthood can inform interventions on the developmental periods individuals are most at risk for short sleep duration. We examined racial/ethnic and sex/gender differences in self-reported sleep duration trajectories from adolescence to adulthood using data from waves I, III, IV, and V of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (1994–2018; n = 12,593). Multigroup growth mixture modeling was used to enumerate sleep duration trajectories from adolescence to adulthood. There were 3 common trajectory types across race/ethnicity and sex/gender groups: 1) consistent increasing short sleepers (i.e., increasing probability of short sleep into adulthood) (67.3%); 2) late-onset short sleepers (i.e., no probability of short sleep duration in adolescence until adulthood) (20.2%); and 3) early-onset short sleepers (i.e., declining probability of short sleep duration from adolescence into adulthood) (12.5%). The prevalence of the consistent-increasing trajectory was highest among Black male respondents, while late onset was highest among White female respondents and early onset greatest among Latinx male respondents. Findings underscore the need to intervene in early adolescence to prevent short sleep duration in adulthood.

Racial/Ethnic and Sex/Gender Differences in Sleep Duration Trajectories From Adolescence to Adulthood in a US National Sample