Association between morningness–eveningness and mental and physical health in adolescents

Abstract

Individuals differ in their biological rhythms and their preference for morning or evening hours. Morning types prefer morning hours for intellectual and physical activities while evening types feel and perform best at late afternoon or in the evening. This not only is a simple dichotomous classification but also can be viewed as a continuum. Individual differences in morningness–eveningness are an interesting facet of personality, but little is known about the relationship between psychological factors or health-related variables and morningness–eveningness in adolescents. In Study I, there were positive correlations between morningness and positive attitude towards life and a negative association between morningness and depression. In Study II, there were significant positive relationships between morningness and physical health, mental health, self-esteem, familial relationship, and school functioning. These results indicate that eveningness might be an unspecific risk factor for mental and physical health.

Keywords:

• adolescents
• chronotype
• circadian preference
• depression
• mental health
• morningness–eveningness
• physical health
• quality of life

Acknowledgements

The author thanks all pupils, teachers and principals of the respective schools for their participation in this study. The study was approved by the Bildungsagentur Sachsen, Regionalstelle Leipzig (R. Schulz). Prof. Dr. A. Grob and PD Dr. U. Ravens-Sieberer (No. 621) gave permissions to use their questionnaires and item batteries in this present study. He thanks D. Koch, A. Schwab and E. Hummel for collecting the data and to D. Koch and A. Schwab for inputting the data into the computer. This study was partially funded by the University of Leipzig.