BALTIMORE—Many student athletes have sleep paralysis and hypnagogic or hypnopompic hallucinations, according to research presented at the 32nd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies. In addition, these sleep symptoms are independently associated with symptoms of depression.
“These sleep symptoms are usually harmless on their own, but they can be a sign of more serious sleep problems,” said Serena Liu, a student research assistant in the Sleep and Health Research Program at the University of Arizona College of Medicine in Tucson. “The fact that they are so common among student athletes suggests that this is a group with some significant sleep problems that should be evaluated and dealt with.”
A Study of NCAA Athletes
Student athletes often have difficulty finding time to rest because of their busy schedules. Shorter sleep duration and poor sleep quality contribute to disordered sleep in many student athletes, and data indicate a high prevalence of common sleep symptoms in this group. Investigators have not studied the prevalence of less common symptoms (eg, sleep paralysis and hypnagogic and hypnopompic hallucinations, which are more prevalent in younger adults) in student athletes, however. Nor have they examined the potential role of these symptoms in mental health, independent of insufficient sleep duration or insomnia.
Ms. Liu and colleagues collected data from 189 student athletes in the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s Division I. The researchers asked the athletes how often they had sleep paralysis and hypnagogic or hypnopompic hallucinations. Responses were “never,” “rarely (once per month or less),” or “often (once or more per week).” Participants also gave information about sleep duration and underwent evaluation with the Insomnia Severity Index and the Centers for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale. Ms. Liu and colleagues performed regression analyses to examine depression score as outcome and sleep symptoms as predictor in a model adjusted for age and sex and a model adjusted for age, sex, insomnia severity, and sleep duration.
Sleep Symptoms May Indicate Other Problems
About 18% of the sample reported having sleep paralysis rarely, and 7% reported having it often. In addition, 24% of the sample reported having hypnagogic or hypnopompic hallucinations rarely, and 11% reported having them often. In models adjusted for age and sex, reporting sleep paralysis rarely and often were associated with higher depression score, compared with reporting them never. Similarly, reporting hypnagogic and hypnopompic hallucinations rarely and often were associated with higher depression score. In models adjusted for insomnia and sleep duration, these relationships were attenuated, but remained significant.