Sleeping on the problem

Sleep is good for your health, say researchers

Sleep problems could be an underlying factor in children's difficult behaviour, say researchers at the University of Oxford.

In particular, researchers in the university's psychiatry department want to find out whether sleep problems are a factor in the growing number of children with "attention deficit hyperactivity disorder".

Children with this disorder, estimated at 4% of the school population, have difficulty in concentrating and can become disruptive, leading to learning problems and a loss to their education.

However researchers at Oxford believe that for some of these children "the basic problem is a primary sleep disorder which impairs the duration and quality of sleep, causing daytime behavioural problems".

Study of sleeping patterns

Rather than attempting to tackle the hyperactive behaviour, researchers are examining whether attention should be paid instead to the lack of undisrupted sleep which could be at the root of the problem.

The research, funded by the Medical Research Council, will study 100 schoolchildren with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, recording sleep patterns over the next two years.

"Parents very often complain of sleep problems in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. It is usually assumed that such problems are the result of the effects of the child's generally overactive state, and to some extent the medication that is often prescribed for the condition," said Dr Gregory Stores, clinical reader in the section of child and adolescent psychiatry.

However, for at least some of these children, disruptions to sleep will be a cause of the behavioural problems, rather than a secondary symptom.