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Chronic insufficient sleep is linked to a variety of adverse health outcomes, and African Americans have been found to have poorer sleep than their non-Hispanic White counterparts. African Americans disproportionately live in low-income disordered neighborhoods which increases their risk of trauma exposure and adversely affects their sleep. Fear of sleep is a construct linked to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). We have reported a relationship between fear of sleep and insomnia in urban residing African Americans. Our objective is to report the relative contributions of neighborhood stress along with PTSD to fear of sleep.The present study features a nonclinical sample of 117 African Americans (ages 18-35) who reside in DC.After controlling for gender, hierarchical linear regression analyses revealed that PTSD severity and perceptions of the neighborhood environment accounted for approximately 32% of the variance in sleep-related fears (∆R2 = .320, p.001). Regression coefficients suggest that perceptions of the neighborhood (β = .360) predict sleep-related fears to a similar degree as PTSD severity (β = .368).Results from this study have implications for interventions to help African Americans to cope with their neighborhood environments effect on their sleep.

Poor sleep is common in our society, particularly for African Americans, and is associated with adverse mental and physical health outcomes. Unwanted, intrusive thoughts contribute to sleep disturbances and can be engendered by living in stressful urban environments, which are disproportionately inhabited by African Americans. Studies of other populations have shown that cognitive coping strategies to manage intrusive thoughts vary in their adaptiveness.To examine the relationship between thought control strategies and insomnia severity in urban residing young-adult African Americans.Sixty-four young adult African Americans completed a demographic questionnaire, the Thought Control Questionnaire for Insomnia-revised, and the Insomnia Severity Index.There were moderate to strong positive correlations of aggressive suppression, worry, behavioral distraction, and social avoidance with ISI scores. Poor sleepers endorsed greater use of worry and aggressive suppression than good sleepers. Results from a multiple linear regression analysis revealed that aggressive suppression, social avoidance, and behavioral distraction significantly predicted insomnia severity, and aggressive suppression was the strongest predictor in the model.These results extend findings of aggressive suppression as a correlate of insomnia severity to an urban-residing young adult African American sample. Future research should identify adaptive approaches and the utility of modifying maladaptive strategies.

Introduction African Americans are disproportionately affected by environmental factors that increase the risk for negative health outcomes. Analyses from National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) data estimated 15 to 75 percent of the disparities between Black and White respondents being accounted for by residential context. Poor sleep health, particularly short sleep duration, has been linked to metabolic and cardiovascular disease. A population study indicated that sleep duration of less than 6 hours was more common among African Americans compared with other racial groups in the United States and this association was accounted for by African Americans living in high density urban environments. Threats of violence may engender feelings of vulnerability when sleeping and be an important determinant of sleep health though this relationship has not been adequately studied. The aim of this study is to determine how an individual’s sleep health relates to violent crime rates in their neighborhood of residence as well as indicators of neighborhood stress endorsed in a self-reported survey. Methods African- American men and women between the ages of 18-35 filled out the insomnia severity index (ISI) and city stress inventory (CSI). Sleep duration and sleep efficiency were obtained through home-based actigraphy. Participants were categorized as poor sleepers if two out of three criteria were met: sleep duration of less than six hours, ISI greater than 10, and sleep efficiency below 85%. Participants addresses were linked to one of the 51 proximal neighborhood groups (PNG) defined by the DC Department of Health and Office of Planning using MAR geocoder and QGIS mapping software. Violent death rates and other social health determinants are indicated by PNG in the DC DOH’s Health Equity Report (2019). Results Sleep measures were not correlated with neighborhood violent death rates (Pearson r’s: .05 - .17; all NS). SE and TST were weakly correlated with CSI scores (both r’s = -.22, NS). Conclusion The negative findings may be related to sample size, the presence of threat and crime in all of the locations, and the importance of individual coping. Support (if any) NIHLB grant R01HL136626 to Dr. Thomas A. Mellman and NCATS grant for a Clinical Translational Science Award UL1-TR001409.

Introduction Chronic insufficient sleep is linked to a variety of adverse health outcomes, with African Americans reporting and objectively receiving poorer sleep outcomes in comparison to their non-Hispanic white counterparts. African Americans live disproportionately in low-income and disordered neighborhoods that increase one’s risk of experiencing a traumatic event and interfere with sleep. It has been demonstrated that posttraumatic stress disorder disrupts sleep in part due to its association with sleep-related fears. However, less research has evaluated the additional contribution of perceived neighborhood stress on the sleep-related fears African Americans experience in their sleep environments. Methods The present study features a nonclinical sample of 163 African American participants (ages 18–35) who reside in DC to investigate whether PTSD severity (Clinician Administered PTSD Scale for DSM-5 Severity Score, CAPS-5) and perceived neighborhood stress (City Stress Index, CSI) are predictive of sleep-related fears (Fear of Sleep Inventory, FoSI). Results After controlling for gender, hierarchical linear regression analyses revealed that PTSD severity and perceptions of the neighborhood environment accounted for approximately 33% of the variance in sleep-related fears (∆R2 = .329, p = .000). Regression coefficients suggest that subjective perceptions of the neighborhood (β = .388) may be a stronger predictor of sleep-related fears than PTSD severity (β = .300) Conclusion Results from this study have implications for future interventions that involve improving coping skills among African Americans in the context of their sleep environments. Support (if any) 5R01HL136626 from the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute

Women are at greater risk than men for developing posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after trauma exposure. Sleep, especially rapid-eye-movement sleep (REMS), has been considered a contributing factor to the development of PTSD symptoms through its effects on the processing of emotional memories. However, it remains unknown if sex and sex hormones play a role in the hypothesized impact of sleep on the development of PTSD. Animal models have methodological advantages over human studies in investigating this research question; however, animal models of sleep in PTSD have been tested only with males. C57BL/6 mice (7 males and 15 females) were exposed to 15 footshocks in a footshock chamber, and 5 min after the last footshock, were returned to their home cages for telemetric electroencephalographic sleep recording. Nine to thirteen days later, mice were returned to the footshock chamber for 10 min without footshocks. Fear recall rates were computed by comparing freezing behaviors in the footshock chamber immediately after the footshocks to those during fear context reexposure. Males had significantly lower recall rates compared to metestrous females (that received footshocks on metestrus). Overall, males slept more than both proestrous females (that received footshocks on proestrus) and metestrous females during the dark period. Regression analyses revealed that average REMS episode durations after footshocks were differentially associated with recall rates across groups, such that the association was positive in males, but negative in proestrous females. Results suggest that both sex and the estrous cycle modulate the associations between REMS continuity and fear memory consolidation.