Sleep-related Complaints in Children 5-13 Years Old: Relationship between Children’s and Parental Appraisals. Part 2

The prevalence of sleep difficulties in children aged 5–13 in the context of rare requests from parents for help to specialists allows us to raise the question of what features of children's sleep parents notice and which of them they consider as a problem. Aim. To identify the features of recognition by parents of sleep difficulties in children aged 5–13 years and their subjective qualification their children’s sleep as a problem. Methods. In 147 pairs of «parent–child 5–13 years old without diagnosed sleep disorders» (47 pairs with a child 5–6 years old, 49 with a child 7–9 years old, 51 with a child 10–13 years old), parents answered questions about the pattern of children's sleep habits and completed the Children's Sleep Habits Questionnaire, while the children answered questions about the children's self–report about their sleep (Sleep Self–Report). Results. Despite the prevalence of various sleep difficulties in children aged 5–13 years, most of the symptoms, unless they are daily or extremely rare and culturally viewed as different from the norm, are rarely considered a problem by parents. The opinions of children and parents in relation to observable, externally verified behavioral manifestations were maximally coherent. The opinions of children and parents on aspects of sleep, which include not the manifestations themselves, but the assessment of their normativity, were not at all consistent with each other. Conclusions. The data point to both the importance of better informing parents about various aspects of children's sleep, and the relevance of clinicians' attention to those features of children's sleep that parents do not notice or are not considered a problem.

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