Psychological Distress Prospectively Predicts Later Sleep Quality in a Sample of Black American Postpartum Mothers

ABSTRACT

Objective: Previous longitudinal studies have demonstrated prospective relationships between maternal sleep quality and subsequent psychological distress in the postpartum period. Despite evidence for prospective relationships between mood and subsequent sleep quality in adult populations, this direction has not been examined in postpartum women. We aimed to test prospective relationships between sleep quality and subsequent psychological distress, as well as the plausible reverse possibility, in a sample of Black American postpartum mothers (n = 146).

Participants: Mothers were recruited prenatally from two hospitals in a Southeastern city of the United States. Eligible and interested mothers enrolled in a follow-up study on infant development. Data from the current study were obtained during the follow-up study.

Method: Mothers reported on their psychological distress (i.e., anxiety, depression, stress) and sleep quality at 3- and 6-months postpartum. We performed hierarchical linear regressions to explore whether 1) maternal sleep quality at 3-months postpartum would predict maternal psychological distress at 6-months postpartum, after adjustment for mothers’ earlier psychological distress, and 2) whether psychological distress at 3-months postpartum would predict maternal sleep quality at 6-months postpartum, after adjustment for mothers’ earlier sleep quality.

Results: Maternal sleep quality at 3-months postpartum was not a significant predictor of psychological distress at 6-months postpartum. However, maternal psychological distress at 3-months postpartum was a significant predictor of sleep quality at 6-months postpartum.

Conclusions: Mothers’ psychological distress earlier in the postpartum was a significant predictor of their later sleep quality. Replication is needed in large, prospective studies, with results stratified by race/ethnicity.

Acknowledgments

We thank participating study mothers and their infants for giving their time so generously.

Authorship contribution statement

Author MFC proposed the current study, conducted the literature review and study analyses, wrote the original draft of the manuscript, and prepared the manuscript for submission. Authors EJC, ALD, and PAB designed the overall longitudinal cohort project (from which the data for the proposed study were drawn) and revised the manuscript. All authors contributed to and have approved of the final manuscript.

Data availability statement

Participants of the current study did not consent for their data to be shared with journal outlets, so supporting data is not available.

Disclosure of potential conflicts of interest

none.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed on the publisher’s website

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) under Grant [5R01MD009746]. The funding sources had no role in study design, in the collection, analysis, and interpretation of study data, in the writing of this manuscript, or in the decision to submit this manuscript for publication.