Negative attention bias and attentional control as mechanisms in the association between insomnia and depression in young people

Evidence supports a causal role of insomnia in the development and maintenance of depression, yet mechanisms underlying this association in young people are not well established. Attention biases have been separately in the sleep and depression fields and represents an important candidate mechanism. Poor lead to a negative attention bias (characteristic of depression) by impacting attentional control. assessed the hypothesis that attentional control and negative attention bias would sequentially mediate relationship between insomnia and depressive symptoms in an unselected sample of young people (17-24 Concerns have been raised regarding the psychometric properties of tasks used to measure attention Dual-Probe Task is emerging as a more reliable measure. Participants (N = 275, Male = 59, M age completed the Dual-Probe Task, a behavioural measure of attentional control, and self-report measures insomnia and depression. Participants completed a one-week sleep diary. Results were consistent with attention bias, but not attentional control, as a mechanism which partially accounts for the relationship sleep (i.e., insomnia severity, sleep duration, sleep efficiency, sleep latency) and depression. This study sleep and negative attention bias as potentially modifiable risk factors to reduce depressive symptoms people.