*The following is excerpted from an online article posted on PsychCentral.
Emerging research finds that insomnia is linked to alcohol use among early adolescents.
Investigators at Rutgers University-Camden examined the associations between alcohol use and four sleep-related issues. Conditions reviewed included, initial insomnia; daytime sleepiness; sleep irregularity, defined as the difference in weekday and weekend bedtimes; and disturbed sleep, characterized as nightmares, snoring, sleepwalking, wetting the bed, and talking in sleep.
“Parents, educators, and therapists should consider insomnia to be a risk marker for alcohol use, and alcohol use a risk marker for insomnia, among early adolescents,” said researcher Dr. Naomi Marmorstein, a professor of psychology.
The study appears in the journal Addictive Behaviors.
When sleep problems were found to be associated with frequency of alcohol use, she examined whether symptoms of mental health problems or levels of parental monitoring accounted for these associations.
The research focused on seventh- and eighth-grade students participating in the Camden Youth Development Study, an initiative funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse at the National Institutes of Health. The study examines the development of mental health problems and resilience among at-risk youth.
Youth completed questionnaires in the classroom that asked several specific questions. Teens were asked how long it took for them to fall asleep, what times they usually went to bed on a weekday and on the weekend or vacation night, how often they experienced sleep disturbances, and whether they ever fell asleep in class or had trouble staying awake after school.
They were also asked the frequency of any alcohol use in the previous four months. In addition, students answered questions which were used to assess depressive symptoms, as well as evidence of conduct disorder symptoms.
Overall, there were associations between alcohol and both insomnia and daytime sleepiness. Importantly, Marmorstein determined that symptoms of mental health problems and parental monitoring did not account for the link between insomnia and alcohol use.
“These findings indicate that insomnia may be a unique risk marker for alcohol use among young adolescents,” she said.
Source: PsychCentral
https://psychcentral.com/news/2017/11/13/teen-insomnia-linked-to-alcohol-use/128698.html