title: Selected sleep disturbances in school children reported by parents: prevalence, interrelationships, behavioral correlates and parental attributions.
abstract: Epidemiological, behavioral and etiological variables related to sleep disturbances were investigated in a survey of 1695 children in Grades 1 to 12 from 11 randomly selected schools. Sleep-walking, nightmares and sleep-talking were strongly associated with each other as well as to a family history of sleep-walking. Enuresis, however, was not related to the other sleep variables. Socioeconomic status of father was weakly related to enuresis and sleep-talking but not to sleep-walking or nightmares. Gender was not related to any of the sleep disturbances. The behavioral variables, physical activity, attention, emotional excitability, and feelings easily hurt showed a small association with the sleep disturbances. Parents most frequently attributed causes of sleep-walking and nightmares to over-tiredness and over-excitement. As well, parents' comments indicated that they tend to associate specific events such as illness or more often, frightening TV content with nightmares, but not sleep-walking.
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001143:Arousal; D002648:Child; D002653:Child Behavior Disorders / Q000523:psychology*; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004325:Dreams; D004775:Enuresis / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D012893:Sleep Wake Disorders / Q000523:psychology*; D013009:Somnambulism / Q000523:psychology