Patterns of sedentary behaviour in adults with acute insomnia derived from actigraphy data

Background Sleep disorders, such as insomnia, have been associated with extended periods of inactive, sedentary behaviour. Many factors contribute to insomnia, including stress, irregular sleep patterns, mental health issues, inadequate sleeping schedules, diseases, neurological disorders and prescription medications. Objectives Identification of the patterns of sedentary time and its duration in adults with acute insomnia and healthy controls to determine the statistically significant sedentary bouts; comparison of the sedentary behaviour patterns in acute insomnia adults with healthy controls. Methods We investigate the daytime actigraphy data and identify temporal patterns of inactivity among adults with acute insomnia and healthy adults. Seven days of actigraphy data were utilised to calculate sedentary time and bouts of variable duration based on a threshold of activity counts (<100 counts per minute). Statistical analysis was applied to investigate sedentary bouts and total sedentary time during weekdays and weekend. A logistic regression model has been used to determine the significance of sedentary bouts. Results We found that individuals with acute insomnia accumulate a significant amount of their sedentary time in medium (6—30 minutes and 31—60 minutes) and longer (more than 60 minutes) duration bouts in comparison to healthy adults. Furthermore, a low p value for total sedentary time (2.54 ⋅ 10−4) association with acute insomnia supports the finding that acute insomnia individuals are significantly more engaged in sedentary activities compared to healthy controls. Also, as shown by the weekend vs weekday analysis, the physical and sedentary activity patterns of acute insomnia adults demonstrate higher variability during the weekdays in comparison to the weekend. Conclusion The results of the present study demonstrate that adults with acute insomnia spend more time in low-intensity daily physical activities compared to healthy adults.