Pre–post study reveals sleep redistribution and links between longer nighttime sleep and better attention in preschoolers, indicating benefits of flexible nap policies.
Key Points
To examine sleep reorganization following the termination of routine group napping in preschool children and to determine its association with sustained attention.
Naturalistic pre–post study of 19 Japanese children (aged 48–59 months) transitioning out of routine group napping in a childcare center.
Sleep parameters measured via 7-day wrist actigraphy (analyzed with the Sadeh algorithm) and parent-reported sleep diaries before and approximately 3 weeks after nap cessation.
Sustained attention measured using a continuous performance test adapted for preschool-aged children.
After nap cessation, bedtime became earlier, time in bed increased, sleep onset latency decreased, sleep efficiency improved, nighttime sleep increased by 31.6 min, and nap duration dropped by 68.8 min, causing a net 37.2-min reduction in total sleep time.
Overall group-level changes in attentional performance were not statistically significant.
Reductions in nap duration correlated with increases in nighttime sleep duration (ρ = −0.49, p = 0.03), and greater nighttime sleep gains correlated with fewer miss errors on the attention test (ρ = −0.58, p = 0.02).