Delaying high school start times impacts depressed mood among students: evidence from a natural experiment.

ABSTRACT:

Purpose

Delaying high school start times prolongs weekday sleep. However, it is not clear if longer sleep reduces depression symptoms and if the impact of such policy change is the same across groups of adolescents.

Methods

We examined how gains in weekday sleep impact depression symptoms in 2,134 high school students (mean age 15.16 ± 0.35 years) from the Minneapolis metropolitan area. Leveraging a natural experiment design, we used the policy change to delay school start times as an instrument to estimate the effect of a sustained gain in weekday sleep on repeatedly measured Kandel-Davies depression symptoms. We also evaluated whether allocating the policy change to subgroups with expected benefit could improve the impact of the policy.

Results

Over 2 years, a susta

SUBMITTER: Sadikova E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11846681 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature