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Violent victimisation trajectories from adolescence through adulthood: consequences for sleep problems
  1. Alexander Testa1,
  2. Daniel C Semenza2,
  3. Dylan B Jackson3
  1. 1 Department of Criminology & Criminal Justice, The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas, USA
  2. 2 Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminal Justice, Rutgers University Camden, Camden, New Jersey, USA
  3. 3 Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
  1. Correspondence to Dr Alexander Testa, Department of Criminology & Criminal Justice, The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, USA; alexander.testa{at}utsa.edu

Abstract

Background Violent victimisation is a stressful experience that has been linked with sleep problems among children, adolescents and adults. However, prior research has not assessed how victimisation trajectories across different stages of the life-course correspond to sleep outcomes. The present study assesses how trajectories of violent victimisation from adolescence to middle adulthood correspond to sleep behaviours in adulthood.

Methods Data are from fives waves of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (N=6015). Semi-parametric group-based trajectory modelling was used to estimate violent victimisation trajectories from adolescence to middle adulthood. Multinomial logistic regression was used to assess the association between sleep quantity and quality across violent victimisation trajectories.

Results The findings demonstrate that the relationship between violent victimisation and sleep in adulthood is not consistent across all victimisation trajectories. Rather, sleep quality and quantity are the worst among those who persistently experience violent victimisation from adolescence through adulthood.

Conclusion Persistent exposure to violence can be a particularly damaging experience with consequences for sleep quantity and quality. Establishing interventions that reduce violent victimisation across the life-course and promote positive sleep behaviours among those with a history of victimisation are important public health measures.

  • sleep
  • violence
  • public health
  • health inequalities
  • health

Data availability statement

Data may be obtained from a third party and are not publicly available. Data are available at https://addhealth.cpc.unc.edu. Authors will make all code and replication material available upon request.

https://doi.org/10.1136/jech-2021-217356

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    Data availability statement

    Data may be obtained from a third party and are not publicly available. Data are available at https://addhealth.cpc.unc.edu. Authors will make all code and replication material available upon request.

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    Footnotes

    • Contributors AT conceptualised and designed the study, and conducted the statistical analyses. AT, DS and DJ drafted the initial manuscript. All authors interpreted the results, and reviewed and revised the manuscript. All authors approved the final manuscript as submitted. AT is responsible for the overall content as guarantor.

    • Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Supplemental material This content has been supplied by the author(s). It has not been vetted by BMJ Publishing Group Limited (BMJ) and may not have been peer-reviewed. Any opinions or recommendations discussed are solely those of the author(s) and are not endorsed by BMJ. BMJ disclaims all liability and responsibility arising from any reliance placed on the content. Where the content includes any translated material, BMJ does not warrant the accuracy and reliability of the translations (including but not limited to local regulations, clinical guidelines, terminology, drug names and drug dosages), and is not responsible for any error and/or omissions arising from translation and adaptation or otherwise.