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Annotated Bibliography

How Will/Should College Students Sleep in the Future?

Kira Marsh

Professor Malcolm Campbell

UWRT 1104

10/18/18
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Annotated Bibliography

Brody, Yosef. “Losing Sleep in the 21st Century.” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers LLC,

07 May 2013, www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/limitless/201305/losing-sleep-in-the-

21st-century. Accessed 11 Oct 2018

This developed article from popular news source “Psychology Today” discusses how and

why much of the American society has developed insomnia and serious sleep deprivation

compared to other centuries. Author and clinical psychologist Yosef Brody, PhD, cites

the U.S Center for Disease Control in saying that these two issues are now a “public

health epidemic.” He notes that scientists don’t know exactly why sleep is needed, but it

does cause various untreated, specific physical and mental effects (including the affective

point that driving quality significantly decreases, causing a safety hazard). Brody then

goes into various reasons why this may be happening by using valid sources as evidence

to his points. For example, he uses sociologist Juliet Schor’s book The Overworked

American as well as surveys and statistics from The National Sleep Foundation to

illustrate that sleep deprivation (and sleep quality) is likely linked to the developing

American society, i.e., a decrease of leisure time and an increase in ‘digital media.’

Brody henceforth uses analyses of the pharmaceutical industry all over the world to cite

the growth of sleep drugs, pointing out that though these drugs may cause cancer and

death (but not really better sleep in the long term), the American society is still one of the

highest consumers of them. He ends the article by citing the actual best ways to improve

sleep quantity and quality as stated by professionals and The Mayo Clinic, the main

solution being cognitive behavioral therapy.

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Because this article is fairly recent (May 2013), by someone with great authority on the

topic, and well substantiated with other organizations/people with great authority, it is

highly reliable and likely accurate. In addition to the credibility already stated, Yosef

Brody has been the president of Psychologists for Social Responsibility. This is

significant because psychologists often are the main people who research and discuss

sleep, so having the point of view from a psychologist with high standing gives me great

insight to their general point of view. Still, in my experience, psychologists tend to be

biased on what the solution to the sleep problem is, and this article isn’t much of an

exception. He never says much about the benefits of using sleeping drugs nor mentions

any other solution. This tells me that I should not take this as set in stone truth, even if he

is a high standing professional. It is unlikely that the article is complete hogwash though,

since Psychology Today is a popular, trusted health magazine that has been produced

since the 1960s. Still, I should think of how times have and will change since 2013 to

keep my findings, inferences, and opinions as accurate and well-founded as possible.

As stated before, this article is a great source for the psychology point of view on sleep

issues of the nation, as through evidence and clear statements, Brody has helped me

better understand and support his point of view on the topic. Additionally, the contents of

this article can help me more accurately evaluate the viability of where others think our

sleep habits should and are heading as well as two solutions to the problem: bettering

sleep hygiene and taking medication. I never thought of the long-term consequences of

sleep medication before, and this article made me begin to think it is not a suitable

solution to the problem. Moreover, this article also talks briefly about what happens if
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you build up ‘sleep debt,’ or cumulative loss of sleep over time, which, like before, will

help me better evaluate other opinions and information I collect. I didn’t even know the

general mechanics of sleep debt until this article. Because of all this, this source is likely

to appear in my EIP.

Galambos, Nancy L., et al. “Rise and Fall of Sleep Quantity and Quality with Student

Experiences Across the First Year of University.” Journal of Research on Adolescence,

vol. 21, no. 2, 17 Aug 2010, Wiley Online Library, www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/, pp.

342–49, doi:10.1111/j.1532-7795.2010.00679.x. Accessed 11 Oct 2018.

This is a peer-reviewed, scholarly journal article by Nancy Galambos, someone with a

PhD in Psychology and a job as a Psychology professor at the University of Alberta (a

Top 5 Canadian University). Galambos examines various sleeping habits of 1st Year,

Canadian college students under 20 years old taken from first-year English classes at a

University (as well as engineering classes separately) via a year-long study. The study

uses well-known and trusted scaled questionnaires such as the Pittsburgh Quality Sleep

Index (PSQI), the Perceived Stress Scale, and the Positive Negative Affect Scale

(PANAS) to precisely and accurately measure subjective truths along with unarguable

facts like gender, high school GPA, and housing situation to help draw connections

between various qualities/factors of a college student and their sleep quality and quantity.

The questionnaires were given about once a month for 7 months, during which they were

only required to recall facts feelings from 14 days ago because “recall of emotions over

14 days is accurate within 1 or 2 days.” Results showed that 45% of sleep quantity
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variation was due to internal, “within person” factors while 55% was from external,

“between persons” factors. Controversially, sleep quality variation was 67% from ‘within

person’ factors and 33% from ‘between persons’ factors. Other, more specific

connections are also made. For example, it is said that “higher social support predicted

more sleep disturbance, an unexpected finding.” This specific point definitely opened my

eyes to unknown factors contributing to sleep loss.

This study does examine Canadian students, meaning the results should be taken with a

grain of salt since my focus is intended to be The United States. This should still be a

good baseline for what college does to a person’s sleep schedule, but analyzing the

differences between Canadians and Americans is necessary if my focus does not shift.

Still, if Canadian and American colleges and people are too different, it would be a great

comparing factor in my EIP. I could say ‘while America is this way because _, Canada is

another way because _. This difference points to the fact (or solution) _.” Other than this

quality, this source is very reliable. The article is peer reviewed and from a source (Wiley

Online Library) that is highly trusted and authoritative. The editor of the journal (The

Journal of Research on Adolescence) is Nancy Guerra, who has a PhD and is a

psychology professor like the author, but also edited two scholarly books such as

Treating the Juvenile Offender. Furthermore, the study was published in 2010, meaning

the findings aren’t ancient enough to disregard as recent but also aren’t new enough to

forget the effect of recent developments like technology. Additionally, as showed before,

the study was very well controlled and produced reliable results free of researcher bias.

There may be participant bias due to them being paid to do the study and the subjective
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topics involved, however this was limited with tested scales that limit subjectivity and the

fact that researchers did not say what results were ‘wanted.’ It is also probable that the

type of participant is well varied when necessary, as most freshman, regardless of their

major, takes a 1st-year English class. Overall it is safe to say the source is reliable.

This article is great for figuring out what the average college student, or at least Canadian

college student, can do to best avoid falling into a void of poor sleeping habits and sleep

debt (which then could lead into poor future sleeping attitudes, inventions, and behavior).

In addition, the results of this article can be applicated, to a degree, to populations other

than what is studied. For example, the external reasons why sleep quality/quantity goes

down for those studied can probably be applied to most adults, helping to analyze what

the future of society means for the future of sleep (and then vis-versa). This article also

made me think differently. I never thought about the difference between ‘within person’

and ‘between persons’ factors, and this article has helped me consider them as an easy

way to categorize and analyze causes. I would definitely use the results of this study as a

source to share how sleep quality/quantity could be affected by various, unexpected

internal/external factors, as this source is as accurate and trustworthy as something could

be regarding these subjective topics.

National Sleep Foundation. National Sleep Foundation, 2018, www.sleepfoundation.org/.

Accessed 10 Oct 2018.

This is the website for a non-profit organization that contains a plethora of information

about sleep myths, sleep disorders, proper sleep environment, and sleep behaviors in
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America. It also contains a section with articles discussing trending sleep topics/problems

such as “Does Sleep Hypnosis Work?”, “How to Feel Satisfied with Your Sleep,” and

even very specific topics such as “How to Handle Obstructive Sleep Apnea During

Menopause.” The topic is always sleep, but what about sleep varies widely. There is a

peer-reviewed journal called “Sleep Health” that is run by the company and linked on the

website. The organization also conducts sleep polls, the results of which are posted on the

site. An example of a useful data sheet from a poll was one conducted this year (2018).

The poll was given to random American citizens, and it analyzed the way they prioritized

their needs. The average prioritization came to be fitness/nutrition first, work second,

hobbies/interests third, and sleep second to last, 1% above social life. While I expected

sleep to be low, I did not expect fitness/nutrition to be so prioritized nor did I expect

social life to be slightly less than sleep. These interesting points changed my view on how

Americans prioritize the things in their life, which is part of my topic.

The National Sleep Foundation is a known U.S, non-profit organization that spreads

information regarding sleep. Because it publishes a peer reviewed journal and has

accessible sleep professionals on the website, at least portions of the website are highly

trustworthy. Additionally, the example poll used a good representative population,

meaning that the polls should also be reliable. The CEO of the foundation is David

Cloud, someone with an MBA who has worked with the American Medical Association

and other healthcare organizations. This means that he has experience in working with

health professionals and therefore is knowledgeable on how to choose the proper medical

professionals to help with the organization. Moreover, the NCBI found the organization’s
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sleep health index to be reliable, making it very likely that most of the site is widely and

rightly trusted as well. The foundation’s mission is to help people make informed

decisions about their health rather than push people in one direction, so bias in the site’s

information is limited. Ergo, while the reliability of every detail on the site is uncertain,

the basis/majority seems to be reliable. In other words, one article may be full of bias, but

the website as a whole can be trusted. I just have to make sure to look out for those

unreliable outliers.

The polls conducted would be more useful if they were repeated over various years to get

a good sense of how these things changed over time, but since they are on random topics

and the earliest one was in 2012, I can only use these poll results as a 21st century point in

the evolution of sleep (or, more specifically, a point for that year, as things change

quickly). Likewise, the foundation was founded in 1990, so all articles and information

on the website will likely be more applicable to modern and/or future sleep topics, which

are still applicable to my EIP. The information spectrum is so broad on just sleep that this

website would be great anytime I need a definition, general additional information on the

topic, or clarity on some sleep phenomena. It would basically act as my fill-in-the-holes

site, as it is like an encyclopedia of sleep information and data. Because this website

would be better for individual points and contains clearly separate articles, however, I am

more likely to cite individual articles within it for my EIP rather than the entire site. Still,

like the poll results detailed earlier did, the discussions and poll results on this site are

likely to help morph my view on the topic, whether they are explicitly used or not.
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Turner, Teri L., et al. “Trending in the Wrong Direction: Changes in Sleep Behaviors, Attitudes

and Knowledge Over Time.” Academic Pediatrics, vol. 13, no. 4, 2013, pp. e7–e7,

Science Direct, doi:10.1016/j.acap. www-sciencedirect-

com.librarylink.uncc.edu/science/article/pii/S1876285913001447. Accessed 10 Oct

2018.

This peer-reviewed, scholarly journal article examines changes in sleep behaviors,

attitudes, and knowledge from 2010 to 2012 in 140 pediatric trainees at Baylor College of

Medicine in Texas. To do this, the entering trainees (43 in 2010, 51 in 2011, and 46 in

2012) were surveyed anonymously before their training. The survey included questions

regarding sleep behaviors, attitudes, and knowledge as well as the questionnaire for the

Epworth Sleepiness Scale, something the NCBI proved was ‘simple and reliable,’ to

accurately and precisely assess daytime sleepiness. Results showed the average daytime

sleepiness scale score increased by about 1.5 points between 2010 and 2012 while there

was a “statistically significant (SS) decrease” in the amount of sleep students got on

weeknights. Furthermore, the participants in 2012 were less likely to “perceive that sleep

loss and fatigue had a major impact on work and medical decisions” while there was no

change in sleep’s perceived effect on personal life or perceived effectiveness of

countermeasures to sleep loss. The article ends with a call to action, namely a push for

interventions during undergraduate college in order to change sleep behaviors and

attitudes early.

The author, study methods, and source all point to this article being highly trustworthy

and useful. Teri Turner is a doctor at the Texas Medical Center with a focus on Academic
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General Pediatrics and Developmental Pediatrics. She was also a relatively high-standing

member of multiple pediatric associations. Having studies (and by the end, opinions)

from a medical doctor rather than a psychologist is not only just as trustworthy but great

for getting a different side and/or angle of the issue. The article was peer-reviewed, and,

as proven before, the methods used were controlled, reliable, and as free of bias as

possible. However, because the subjects and timeframe were limited, stretching the

results to other people must be done with care and inquisition. This includes the fact that

technology and other trends/inventions that affect sleep have significantly increased in

popularity since the study was conducted. In addition, this article was published on

Science Direct, which is “the world’s leading source for scientific, technical, and medical

research” according to their about page. While this could be a marketing strategy, the

reliability of the source is solidified by it being a database from Elsevier, a widely known

and trusted source of scientific and medical information. Finally, Academic Pediatrics is

the official journal of the Academic Pediatric Association, a credible organization that

nurtures and honors successful (academically or career-wise) pediatricians. This verifies

the authenticity of the journal.

The results can be used to help figure out and prove isolated trends in changes of sleep

behaviors/attitudes, which would then help me find possible reasons why these changes

occur and therefore help me predict what shifts will be made in the future. One example

of a trend found in the article that I did not expect to see was the minimal change in

perceived effect of sleep on social life. On top of that, I did not think significant data

point changes could be seen in such a short period of time, and the fact that they were
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points to the rapid worsening of the sleep loss epidemic. These points make this source

necessary to help consider and prove all stated factors. Furthermore, this study was on

people just older than the population of interest, and because of this and the fact that the

population studied obviously went to college, I could definitely use this source to help

understand how and why sleep attitudes change among those who have gone to college.

While the Canadian study looks at students upon entry to college, this source looks at

students upon exiting college. By using the Canadian study as a starting point and ‘why’

source while also using this as an endpoint (considering the former is on the average 1st

year college student while the latter is on pediatric students in Texas), I could infer what

college does to sleep attitudes and behaviors and why. Additionally, I could use the

professional opinion at the end to help develop my list of potential solutions to the

epidemic. Because this study has a limited scope, I wouldn’t use this as a sole form of

proving trends in sleep attitudes/behaviors. However, due to its academic nature and

interesting findings, it is a good start and/or comparison point for use in my EIP.