ABSTRACT
MBTs are increasingly being investigated as a viable treatment of insomnia or sleep disturbance. To date, 13 trials published since 2010 suggest that MBTs are efficacious for improving symptoms of insomnia and sleep quality relative to psychological placebos and inactive control conditions with medium to large effects. Limited evidence suggests that these effects are sustained at 3-month follow-up. Despite this, limited data were collected evaluating the empirically supported mechanisms or processes of change. The authors propose a testable model in the psychological process model of sleep that they hope will advance the next generation of research into MBTs for insomnia.
Subject(s)
Mindfulness , Sleep Initiation and Maintenance Disorders , Humans , Sleep , Sleep Initiation and Maintenance Disorders/therapyABSTRACT
A directed forgetting (DF) paradigm was used to compare the remembering and forgetting of participants with good sleep quality to those with poor sleep quality and the presence of insomnia symptoms. This study implemented a point system in place of remember and forget instructions in a DF task with the goal of computing DF costs and benefits. Relations among memory, sleep, and working memory capacity (WMC) were also examined. DF benefits were observed in both groups, with negative costs found for participants without the presence of insomnia symptoms. WMC was found to be related to memory for positive point items only, and did not differ based on sleep quality. These results suggest that the presence of self-reported insomnia symptoms does not affect performance on a DF task.
Subject(s)
Memory, Short-Term/physiology , Mental Recall/physiology , Sleep Initiation and Maintenance Disorders/physiopathology , Sleep/physiology , Adolescent , Adult , Female , Humans , Male , Young AdultABSTRACT
Mindfulness-based therapies (MBTs) are increasingly being investigated as a treatment for insomnia and general sleep disturbance, but significant gaps remain in the evidence base. In this article, the authors present (1) a unifying psychological process model that relates mindfulness to sleep; (2) a systematic review of the literature reporting on trials of MBTs for insomnia and sleep disturbance, which includes an assessment of quality of trial reporting, adaptation of MBTs for sleep, and whether mindfulness practice was associated with effects observed; and (3) a meta-analysis of MBTs for insomnia and sleep disturbance compared with attention/education and waitlist control groups.
