Development and testing of the Sleep Health And Wellness Questionnaire (SHAWQ) in adolescents and university students: composite SHAWQ scores are associated with sleep problems, depression symptoms, and academic performance.

Introduction: Sleep problems frequently arise during adolescence and early adulthood and may contribute to the onset of depression. However, few sleep health instruments have been developed for use in student populations. Here, we developed a brief sleep health questionnaire for identifying adolescents and university students with sleep problems who may be at risk of depression. Methods: In Study 1, sleep survey data in adolescents ( Results: Across studies, SHAWQ scores were associated with higher depression and anxiety scores, excessive daytime sleepiness, lower sleep quality scores, and higher insomnia severity scores, demonstrating good convergent validity. Associations of SHAWQ scores with depression symptoms were stronger compared with anxiety symptoms. SHAWQ scores showed moderate test-retest reliability. Large effect sizes were observed for bad vs. good sleep health for all sleep and mental health variables. In both cohorts of university freshmen, students with bad sleep health had lower academic performance based on their GPA and percentile rank. Conclusion: Our findings suggest that the SHAWQ could be used to screen for students in their teens and twenties with bad sleep health who would benefit from counseling for sleep and mental health.