Are some children genetically predisposed to poor sleep? A polygenic risk study in the general population

Desana Kocevska; Katerina Trajanoska; Rosa H Mulder; M Elisabeth Koopman-Verhoeff; Annemarie I Luik; Henning Tiemeier; Eus J W van Someren

doi:10.1111/jcpp.13899

Are some children genetically predisposed to poor sleep? A polygenic risk study in the general population

J Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2024 May;65(5):710-719. doi: 10.1111/jcpp.13899. Epub 2023 Nov 8.

Authors

Desana Kocevska^{1

2

3}, Katerina Trajanoska^#⁴, Rosa H Mulder^#^{2

3}, M Elisabeth Koopman-Verhoeff^{2

3}, Annemarie I Luik^{2

5}, Henning Tiemeier⁶, Eus J W van Someren^{1

7

8}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Sleep and Cognition, Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
² Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry/Psychology, Erasmus MC University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
³ Generation R Study, Erasmus MC University Medical Center Rotterdam, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
⁴ Department of Internal Medicine, Erasmus MC University Medical Center Rotterdam, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
⁵ Department of Epidemiology, Erasmus MC University Medical Center Rotterdam, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
⁶ The Department of Social and Behavioral Science, Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA.
⁷ Department of Psychiatry, Amsterdam Public Health Research Institute and Amsterdam Neuroscience Research Institute, Amsterdam UMC, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
⁸ Department of Integrative Neurophysiology, Center for Neurogenomics and Cognitive Research, Amsterdam Neuroscience, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

^# Contributed equally.

PMID: 37936537
DOI: 10.1111/jcpp.13899

Abstract

Background: Twin studies show moderate heritability of sleep traits: 40% for insomnia symptoms and 46% for sleep duration. Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified genetic variants involved in insomnia and sleep duration in adults, but it is unknown whether these variants affect sleep during early development. We assessed whether polygenic risk scores for insomnia (PRS-I) and sleep duration (PRS-SD) affect sleep throughout early childhood to adolescence.

Methods: We included 2,458 children of European ancestry (51% girls). Insomnia-related items of the Child Behavior Checklist were reported by mothers at child's age 1.5, 3, and 6 years. At 10-15 years, the Sleep Disturbance Scale for Children and actigraphy were assessed in a subsample (N = 975). Standardized PRS-I and PRS-SD (higher scores indicate genetic susceptibility for insomnia and longer sleep duration, respectively) were computed at multiple p-value thresholds based on largest GWAS to date.

Results: Children with higher PRS-I had more insomnia-related sleep problems between 1.5 and 15 years (B_{PRS-I < 0.001} = .09, 95% CI: 0.05; 0.14). PRS-SD was not associated with mother-reported sleep problems. A higher PRS-SD was in turn associated with longer actigraphically estimated sleep duration (B_{PRS-SD < 5e08} = .05, 95% CI: 0.001; 0.09) and more wake after sleep onset (B_{PRS-SD < 0.005} = .25, 95% CI: 0.04; 0.47) at 10-15 years, but these associations did not survive multiple testing correction.

Conclusions: Children who are genetically predisposed to insomnia have more insomnia-like sleep problems, whereas those who are genetically predisposed to longer sleep have longer sleep duration, but are also more awake during the night in adolescence. This indicates that polygenic risk for sleep traits, based on GWAS in adults, affects sleep already in children.

Keywords: GWAS; Insomnia; actigraphy; childhood sleep; polygenic risk score; sleep duration.

MeSH terms

Adolescent
Adult
Child
Child, Preschool
Female
Genetic Predisposition to Disease
Genome-Wide Association Study
Humans
Male
Sleep / genetics
Sleep Initiation and Maintenance Disorders*
Sleep Wake Disorders*

Abstract

MeSH terms

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