Reduced impact of alcohol use on next-day tiredness in older relative to younger adults: A role for sleep duration.

Abstract

Recent work suggests that older adults may be less susceptible to the next-day effects of alcohol relative to younger adults. The effects of alcohol in younger adults may be mediated by sleep duration but, due to age differences in the contexts of alcohol use, this mediation process may not generalize to older adults. The present study examined age group (younger versus older adults) differences in how alcohol use influenced next-day tiredness during daily life. Reports of alcohol use, sleep duration, and next-day tiredness obtained on ~101 days from 91 younger adults (age 20–31 years) and 75 older adults (age 65–80 years) were modeled using a multilevel, moderated mediation framework. Findings indicate that (1) Greater than usual alcohol use was associated with greater than usual tiredness in younger adults only; (2) greater than usual alcohol use was associated with shorter than usual sleep duration in younger adults only; and (3) shorter than usual sleep duration was associated with greater tiredness in both younger and older adults. For the prototypical younger adult, a significant portion (43%) of the association between alcohol use and next-day tiredness could be explained assuming mediation through sleep duration, while there was no evidence of mediation for the prototypical older adult. Findings of age differences in the mediation process underlying associations among alcohol use, sleep, and tiredness provide insight into the mechanisms driving recent observations of reduced next-day effects of alcohol in older relative to younger adults.

Within-person variability in sensation-seeking during daily life: Positive associations with alcohol use and self-defined risky behaviors.

“…Additional analyses confirm that results for alcohol use are robust to the inclusion of participants exhibiting no alcohol use throughout the 21 days and who thus could not provide insight into the within-person association between sensation-seeking and alcohol use (see Lydon-Staley et al, 2017;Ram et al, 2017; Table S1). Results for alcohol use and risk-taking are also robust to the inclusion of previous day's sensation-seeking as well as controlling for previous day's alcohol use (Table S2) and previous day's risk-taking (Table S3).…”

The Association between Chronotype and Dietary Pattern among Adults: A Scoping Review

“…Evening chronotypes were reported to consume more alcohol and caffeine, which is widely recognised for its stimulant properties that can boost wakefulness and concentration by increasing brain activity [83][84][85]. However, many other studies have demonstrated how an excessive intake of alcohol and caffeine can result in reduced sleep duration and quality, increased fatigue and daytime sleepiness, and delayed sleep onset [85][86][87][88][89][90]. According to Galli et al (2013), each alcoholic drink (contain 14g of alcohol) can reduce sleep duration by 30 min.…”

Insomnia Symptoms among African-American Older Adults in Economically Disadvantaged Areas of South Los Angeles

“…Various factors associated with insomnia symptoms in the African-American population may include socioeconomic status (SES) [17], discrimination [18], chronic pain [19], mental illness [6], self-rated health [20], and chronic disease [21]. In addition, studies focused on older adults have found that smoking and alcohol use directly affect the duration and quality of sleep, yet this is under-examined within the older African-American population [22,23]. Altogether, these factors have not been well-studied among the older age cohort of African-Americans in relation to the frequency of insomnia symptoms, which may be linked to adverse health outcomes in this group.…”