Bidirectional Day-to-Day Associations of Reported Sleep Duration With Accelerometer Measured Physical Activity and Sedentary Time Among Dutch Adolescents: An Observational Study

Objectives: To examine the bidirectional association of sleep duration with proportions of time spent in physical behaviors among Dutch adolescents. Methods: Adolescents (n = 294, 11–15 years) completed sleep diaries and wore an accelerometer (ActiGraph) over 1 week. With linear mixed-effects models, the authors estimated the association of sleep categories (short, optimal, and long) with the following day’s proportion in physical behaviors. With generalized linear mixed models with binomial distribution, the authors estimated the association of physical behavior proportions on sleep categories. Physical behavior proportions were operationalized using percentages of wearing time and by applying a compositional approach. All analyses were stratified by gender accounting for differing developmental stages. Results: For males (number of observed days: 345, n = 83), short as compared with optimal sleep was associated with the following day’s proportion spent in sedentary (−2.57%, p = .03, 95% confidence interval [CI] [−4.95, −0.19]) and light-intensity activities (1.96%, p = .02, 95% CI [0.27, 3.65]), which was not significant in the compositional approach models. Among females (number of observed days: 427, n = 104), long sleep was associated with the proportions spent in moderate- to vigorousintensity physical activity (1.69%, p < .001, 95% CI [0.75, 2.64]) and in sedentary behavior (−3.02%, p < .01, 95% CI [−5.09, −0.96]), which was replicated by the compositional approach models. None of the associations between daytime activity and sleep were significant (number of obs.: 844, n = 204). Conclusions: Results indicate partial associations between sleep and the following day’s physical behaviors, and no associations between physical behaviors and the following night’s sleep.