The central aim of this study was to investigate hormones as a predictor of individual vulnerability or resiliency on emotion processing tasks following one night of sleep restriction. The restriction group was instructed to sleep 3 a.m.–7 a.m. (13 men, 13 women in follicular phase, 10 women in luteal phase of menstrual cycle), and a control group slept 11 p.m.–7 a.m. (12 men, 12 follicular women, 12 luteal women). Sleep from home was verified with actigraphy. Saliva samples were collected on the evening prior to restriction, and in the morning and afternoon following restriction, to measure testosterone, estradiol, and progesterone. In the laboratory, event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded during presentation of images and faces to index neural processing of emotional stimuli. Compared to controls, sleep-restricted participants had a larger amplitude Late Positive Potential (LPP) ERP to positive vs neutral images, reflecting greater motivated attention towards positive stimuli. Sleep-restricted participants were also less accurate categorizing sad faces and exhibited a larger N170 to sad faces, reflecting greater neural reactivity. Sleep-restricted luteal women were less accurate categorizing all images compared to control luteal women, and progesterone was related to several outcomes. Morning testosterone in men was lower in the sleep-restricted group compared to controls; lower testosterone was associated with lower accuracy to positive images, a greater difference between positive vs neutral LPP amplitude, and lower accuracy to sad and fearful faces. In summary, women higher in progesterone and men lower in testosterone were more vulnerable to the effects of sleep restriction on emotion processing tasks. This study highlights a role for sex and sex hormones in understanding individual differences in vulnerability to sleep loss.

No abstract

Study Objectives This study investigated the role of pubertal status and hormones in the association between sleep satisfaction and self-reported emotion functioning in 256 children and adolescents aged 8-15. Methods Self-report data was provided on sleep duration, sleep satisfaction, and emotion reactivity and regulation, and a saliva sample was obtained for hormone measures. A subset of children also wore an Actigraph watch to measure sleep for a week. Results Latent-class analysis revealed three classes of sleepers: Satisfied, Moderately Satisfied, Dissatisfied. Dissatisfied sleepers reported more difficulties with emotion regulation and greater emotion reactivity than Satisfied sleepers. High difficulties with emotion regulation was associated with shorter objective sleep duration, and high emotion reactivity was associated with lower sleep efficiency. For girls, Dissatisfied sleepers reported being further through pubertal development than Satisfied sleepers. There were also significant correlations between pubertal development and shorter sleep duration and longer sleep latency in girls, and shorter and more irregular sleep in boys. Finally, pubertal development in girls was a significant moderator in the relationship between sleep satisfaction and difficulties with emotion regulation in Dissatisfied sleepers, such that being further through puberty and having unsatisfactory sleep resulted in the highest emotion regulation difficulties. Conclusions This study expands on previous literature by considering the role of sleep satisfaction and the interaction with puberty development on emotion function. Specifically, a role for pubertal development was identified in the association between unsatisfactory sleep and emotion regulation in girls.

Few studies have experimentally manipulated sleep to study its effect on aggressive behavior. The current study examined how reactive aggression was affected by having sleep restricted to 4-hours on a single night, a level of disruption commonly experienced. Both rested and sleep-restricted participants completed the Point Subtraction Aggression Paradigm (PSAP), a laboratory task in which participants seek to earn points, are provoked by a fictitious opponent stealing their points, and may choose to steal points in response. Logistic mixed-effect models were used to investigate the effect of sleep restriction and the role of sex hormones on the odds of choosing to steal. For men, and women in the luteal phase of the menstrual cycle, sleep restriction did not result in significant changes reactive aggression, although the patterns of aggressive behavior appeared less reactive and retaliatory in nature. For women in the follicular phase of the menstrual cycle, sleep restriction was associated with higher levels of reactive aggression. For both men and women in the luteal phase, sleep restriction disrupted an association between hormone change over the task (testosterone and estradiol, respectively) and reactive aggression that was observed in their control participants. In addition, higher testosterone before the PSAP in men was associated with maintaining a high level of stealing over the task. These results indicate a complex dynamic in which sex hormones and sleep interact to predict aggressive behavior in response to provocation. K E Y W O R D Sestradiol, hormones, reactive aggression, sleep, sleep restriction, testosterone

Despite complaints of difficulties in waking socioemotional functioning by individuals with insomnia, only a few studies have investigated emotion processing performance in this group. Additionally, the role of sleep in socioemotional processing has not been investigated extensively nor using quantitative measures of sleep. Individuals with insomnia symptoms (n = 14) and healthy good sleepers (n = 15) completed two nights of at-home polysomnography, followed by an afternoon of in-lab performance testing on tasks measuring the processing of emotional facial expressions. The insomnia group self-reported less total sleep time, but no other group differences in sleep or task performance were observed. Greater beta EEG power throughout the night was associated with higher intensity ratings of happy, fearful and sad faces for individuals with insomnia, yet blunted sensitivity and lower accuracy for good sleepers. Thus, the presence of hyperarousal differentially impacted socioemotional processing of faces in individuals with insomnia symptoms and good sleepers.