Mental Health Disorders: Can Quality Sleep Increase Your Resilience?

Who doesn’t love a good night’s rest? High-quality sleep has been linked to increased resistance against heart attacks, strokes, diabetes, and cancers. Research has now advocated that sleeping well can help build resilience against depression and anxiety (1^✔ ✔Trusted Source
The influence of emotion regulation strategies and sleep quality on depression and anxiety

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Depression and Anxiety: How Looking at the Brighter Side and Quality Sleep can help

Chronic stress is a major risk factor for a variety of mental health disorders, including depression and pathological anxiety. The study was led by researchers from the University of York and highlighted that high-quality sleep and coping strategies, such as the ability to reframe a situation to see the positive side, can help prevent poor mental health when faced with negative or stressful experiences. The research studied data from over 600 participants during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 - an extended stressful period of time. They aimed to test the theory that coping strategies supported positive mental health outcomes, which could be strengthened by high-quality sleep.

“As the COVID-19 pandemic has been a prolonged period of stress for people across the entire world, it offered us a unique context with which to address our research questions.”

“This is the first study to investigate the ways in which positive coping strategies and sleep quality influence depression and anxiety when experiencing a real-world chronic stressor. We found that better sleep quality was associated with fewer symptoms of both depression and anxiety during the initial months of the COVID-19 pandemic.”

“These findings highlight the importance of targeting both positive coping strategies and sleep quality when enduring periods of chronic stress," said Emma Sullivan, Ph.D. student, Department of Psychology, University of York.

The researchers examined data from the Boston College Daily Sleep and Well-being Survey, in which participants self-reported their sleep quality and mental well-being throughout the pandemic.

They also took a baseline demographic survey to find out their age, gender, and ethnicity. The surveys collected a multitude of additional information, such as participants' alcohol use, quarantine status, and physical activity levels, in addition to information on participants' sleep and mental well-being.

High-Quality Sleep Associated with Better Stress Management

Dr. Scott Cairney, a Ph.D. supervisor on the project from the Department of Psychology at the University of York, said: "We have known for a long time that high-quality sleep is associated with better health and well-being outcomes, but we wanted to know whether this would change if sleep and coping strategies were put under intense and prolonged periods of stress, as it was for so many during the pandemic."

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"We found that sleep plays a hugely important role in the management of chronic stress and can sustain well-being over a long period of time, reducing symptoms of depression and anxiety."

Reference:

1. The influence of emotion regulation strategies and sleep quality on depression and anxiety - (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S001094522300151X)

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Source-Medindia