Sleep duration, depressive symptoms, and digital self‐harm among adolescents

摘要

Background This study examines the relationship between sleep duration, depression, and engagement in a novel cyber behavior, digital self‐harm, among adolescents. Method Logistic regression analyses were conducted using cross‐sectional data from the 2019 Florida Youth Substance Abuse Survey (N?=?9,819; 48 male; avg. grade level?=?9th grade SD?=?1.9) to analyze the association between sleep duration and digital self‐harm. A Karlson–Holm–Breen (KHB) analysis was used to assess whether depressive symptoms attenuate this association. Results Bivariate results indicated that longer sleep duration was associated with lower incidence of digital self‐harm. Multivariate results showed that sleep duration was inversely associated with engaging in digital self‐harm, net of all covariates. Depressive symptoms attenuated the influence of sleep duration on digital self‐harm by 50.72. Conclusions Both insufficient sleep and depressive symptoms were associated with engagement in digital self‐harm among adolescents. Prospective research is needed, however, to confirm this pathway. Practitioners and clinicians should consider discussing digital self‐harm with adolescents and parents, especially if adolescents are experiencing poor sleep and depressive symptoms.