1000 The Association Between Sleep Problems and Self-Rated Psychotic Experiences

Abstract Introduction Schizophrenia spectrum and other psychotic disorders are associated with a wide variety of functional impairments that interfere with daily functioning. Sleep is one domain that is disturbed in almost 80% of people experiencing schizophrenia and similar symptoms. We hypothesized that self-reported sleep disturbances would significantly predict tendencies consistent with schizophrenia and its associated subdomains—psychotic experiences, social detachment, and thought disorder symptoms. Social detachment and thought disorder symptoms are transdiagnostic traits that span many psychopathologies. We further hypothesized that each subdomain may be differentially associated with unique types of sleep disturbances. Methods Our sample comprised 190 participants with a mean age of 25 years old (SD=6. 81) and a sex ratio of 71 males to 119 females. Each participant completed the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI) to assess aspects of mental health consistent with schizophrenia spectrum disorders and the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) to assess sleep disturbances according to seven facets: subjective sleep quality, latency, duration, efficiency, disturbance, sleep medication use, and daytime dysfunction (DD). We used a stepwise linear regression to predict schizophrenia domain severity from sleep problems. Bivariate correlations were run to clarify the associations between schizophrenia and sleep disturbance subdomains. Results When considered in combination, self-reported DD was the only significant predictor of schizophrenic domain severity (β=. 489, p. 001; R²=. 239: F (1) =54. 874, p. 001). Individually, the psychotic experiences domain was correlated with DD (r=. 230, p=. 002) and sleep disturbances (r=. 201, p=. 007). Self-reported thought disorder traits were significantly related to sleep disturbances (r=. 254, p. 001), DD (r=. 491, p. 001), sleep medication use (r=. 178, p=. 016), and subjective sleep quality (r=. 312, p. 001). Social detachment was correlated with DD (r=. 322, p. 001) and sleep efficiency (r=-. 162, p=. 030). Conclusion Sleep-related daytime impairment predicted greater severity on the schizophrenia scale of the PAI and was associated with all related subdomains. Additionally, each of the subdomains were correlated with sleep disturbances, which could reflect the hyperarousal found with positive symptoms disturbing sleep maintenance. Sleep related interventions could contribute to reducing schizophrenia symptom severity. As hypothesized, specific sleep disturbance facets were differentially associated with schizophrenia subdomains. Each of these sleep facets may serve as important therapeutic targets in minimizing symptom severity in schizophrenia spectrum disorders. Support (if any) USAMRAA: W81XWH1210386