Original articleThe relationship between sleeping problems and aggression, anger, and impulsivity in a population of juvenile and young offenders
Section snippets
Participants
Two hundred fifty male offenders were approached; 186 questionnaires were returned (completion rate 74%), with two multivariate outliers removed. The final sample thus comprised 184 offenders (104 young [age range 18–20 years] and 80 juvenile offenders [age range 14–17 years]).
Sleeping behavior: quantity and quality
Table 1 outlines sleeping patterns reported in prison and before prison. Table 2 presents self-reported behaviors reported likely to be associated with poor sleeping patterns.
Participants reported more sleep before than during prison (F [1,148] = 30.8, p < .001, partial Eta2 = .017). Juveniles reported more hours sleep in prison and before prison than young offenders (F [1,170] = 13.8, p < .04, partial Eta2 = .026; F [1,170] = 39.9, p < .03, partial Eta2 = .031, respectively).
A higher
Discussion
The current study provides evidence that overall aggression is predictive of sleep quantity and quality in a sample of incarcerated adolescent male offenders. It supported the hypothesis that sleep difficulties would be predicted by increased aggression, and is consistent with previous research reporting a link between aggression and sleep difficulties [15]. It is also arguably consistent with research among adolescents indicating an association between sleeping difficulties and problems in
Acknowledgment
Thanks are extended to Rachel Monaghan for assistance with data collection, and to all the prisoners who took part in the study.
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