Gender differences in the sleep habits of 11-13 year olds

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: Sleep plays an important role in the physical and emotional development of adolescents. The aim of this study was to examine gender differences in sleep habits in a sample of 11-13 year olds. METHOD: The study was carried out in the city of Patos de Minas, Brazil. The study cohort was composed of 200 students (96 boys and 104 girls) attending (in the morning or in the afternoon) the 5th, 6th or 7th grades, with ages ranging from 11 to 13 years. A Sleep Questionnaire developed at the Federal University of São Paulo was used in order to evaluate student sleep habits and schedules, as well as the overall quality of sleep. RESULTS: For the period between Friday night and Sunday morning, girls displayed longer sleep duration than did boys. During the week, students attending only afternoon classes woke up later than did students attending only morning classes. In addition, morning-class students showed more adverse effects on sleep, including irregular sleep/wakefulness circadian rhythms, when compared with afternoon-class students. CONCLUSION: Sleep habits are affected by gender and school schedule.

Sleep–wake habits and circadian preference in Mexican secondary school

“…Adolescents who attended classes in an afternoon shift slept an average of 9 hours and 23 minutes during the week, which is slightly higher than has been reported in countries where the school system has an afternoon shift such as Croatia [72], Brazil [67,73], Greece [74], and even in an earlier study in Mexico [53] which report an average weekday sleep duration of 8 to 8.30 hours. Thus adolescents who have the opportunity to attend classes in an afternoon shift have a substantial sleep duration that meets the recommended duration [6,[60][61][62][63][64][65][66][67][68][69][70], regardless of their chronotype.…”

Sleep and school education

“…A seemingly minor modification has to do with the time of class onset. Adolescents, whose circadian rhythms are better adapted to afternoons [1,49], are handicapped for morning learning [29,101], in part due to sleep inertia [24,84] and to the substantial modifications in sleep patterns and hormonal regulation experienced by teenagers [28]. Phase delays in the circadian timing of sleep during adolescence can favor the accumulation of persisting sleep deficits if school starts too early.…”

Sleep-patterns, co-sleeping and parent's perception of sleep among school children: Comparison of domicile and gender

“…Girls have been found to have longer sleep and they spend more time in motionless sleep [16]. To make the issue further complex, a study from Brazil showed that girls had a longer nighttime sleep on holidays but not on weekdays [17]. Another study from Japan showed that girls had a longer sleep onset latency as compared to boys [18].…”

“…Another study from Japan showed that girls had a longer sleep onset latency as compared to boys [18]. Thus, it appears that gender influences some of the sleep parameters that but the results were inconsistent among studies [16], [17], [18], [19].…”