Trajectories of sleep problems among adolescents after the Wenchuan earthquake: the role of posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms.

We examined the trajectories of sleep problems in adolescents after the Wenchuan earthquake, and assessed predictors such as posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms. We surveyed adolescents at 1, 1.5, 2, and 2.5 years after the Wenchuan earthquake. In total, 391 adolescents completed self-report questionnaires. We identified five latent sleep problem trajectories, specifically, U-shaped (3.8%), low-stable (68.0%), high-stable (10.8%), increasing (8.7%), and decreasing (8.7%) trajectories. Additionally, we found that posttraumatic stress disorder hyper-arousal symptoms were more frequent in individuals who had non-low-stable trajectories. Adolescents in the U-shaped group were less likely to have intrusive symptoms. After natural disasters, consequent sleep problems in adolescents do not remain stable over time, and sleep problem trajectories had considerable heterogeneity.