Elizabeth Strock

Previous studies have reported inconsistent results regarding the relationship between negative affect and various sleep-wake variables. Furthermore, these results have not been quantitatively evaluated. The purpose of this study was to meta-analytically examine the relationship between negative affect and five sleep-wake variables that were measured with subjective or objective sleep measures. A literature search was conducted across multiple online databases. After excluding articles that did not meet the inclusion criteria, there were 45 contributing empirical studies. The data from these articles were meta-analyzed using a package in RStudio. The final results showed that when measured with subjective or objective sleep measures, sleep continuity, sleep duration, and overall sleep all displayed negative correlations with negative affect. Daytime dysfunction correlated positively with negative affect. Although there were not enough studies to conduct a meta-analysis for sleep medication, it is possible that it would also display a positive correlation with negative affect. The findings lead to the conclusion that those who experience higher levels of negative affect experience worse sleep continuity, shorter sleep duration, and worse overall sleep. Furthermore, those who experience higher levels of negative affect are more likely to experience daytime dysfunction. However, only a few studies reported relations between negative affect and daytime dysfunction, so those results are subject to future revision. Implications for research and applications are discussed.