Association of Exposure to Interpersonal Racism and Racial Disparities in Inadequate Sleep Risk.

Objective: To examine the association between caregiver-report of their child's inadequate sleep and exposure to interpersonal racism within racially minoritized subpopulations.
Study Design: We conducted cross-sectional analysis among racially minoritized 21 924 school-aged children and 27 142 adolescents using a National Survey of Children's Health sample from 2016 through 2021. Multivariable logistic regression models were fit to estimate predicted probabilities for the adjusted associations between caregiver-report of their child's inadequate sleep and prior exposure to interpersonal racism.
Results: In bivariate models, caregiver report of child exposure to interpersonal racism was significantly associated with a higher probability of inadequate sleep within non-Hispanic Asian American/Pacific Islander school-aged children, Hispanic adolescents, and non-Hispanic multiracial adolescents. After adjusting for covariates, only the association within Hispanic youth remained significant though attenuated. Unexpectedly, non-Hispanic Black school-age children exposed to racism had a lower probability of inadequate sleep than non-Hispanic Black children without exposure to racism after adjusting for covariates.
Conclusions: Nationally representative pooled data that showed caregiver-report of Hispanic adolescents' inadequate sleep was associated with their exposure to interpersonal racism, although an association with inadequate sleep was not found in other racially minoritized subpopulations. Examining within-race associations helps to assess more accurately risk and target efforts that seek to address racism-related stress among racially minoritized subpopulations.
Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest At the time of this study, M.A.D.’s time was funded by the National Heart, Lung, Blood Institute (NHLBI) award number: 1K01HL169493-01.The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this manuscript.
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