Moderating Effect of Gender in the Relationship between Depression and Waketime Procrastination in Insomnia Patients

Abstract

Background and Objective Waketime procrastination (WP) is a behavior involving delaying getting out of bed in the morning despite being awake. Previous studies have noted a relationship between WP and depression, but there have been a lack of empirical studies investigating this relationship. This study aimed to examine the moderating effect of gender in the relationship between depression and WP in insomnia patients. Methods Participants consisted of 78 adults (men = 52.6%, women = 47.4%), who met DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for insomnia disorder. All participants completed the Korean version of Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale-Revised (K-CESD-R) and sleep diaries for a week. WP behavior was calculated based on sleep diary data using the difference in time between wake time and time out of bed. Weekday and weekend sleep diary data were analyzed separately, as many individuals display different sleep behaviors on the weekend compared to the weekdays. Results Results indicated a significant positive relationship between WP and depression (r = 0.335, p < 0.01). Gender moderated the relationship between depression and WP on both weekdays and weekends [B = −1.239, 95% confidence interval (CI) = −2.092, −0.386 and B = 2.136, 95% CI = 0.643, 3.630, respectively]. Men with high depression showed more WP on weekdays, while women with high depression showed more WP on weekends. Conclusions WP may be an important behavior to consider in the clinical context of providing sleep treatment for individuals who are depressed, especially when considering gender differences.

Keywords

• waketime
• procrastination
• depression
• insomnia
• gender