Related Experiment Video
Updated: May 28, 2026
Measuring Neural Mechanisms Underlying Sleep-Dependent Memory Consolidation During Naps in Early Childhood
Published on: October 2, 2019
Acute sleep restriction effects on emotion responses in 30- to 36-month-old children
Rebecca H Berger1, Alison L Miller, Ronald Seifer
1Bradley/Hasbro Children's Research Center, Bradley Hospital, East Providence, RI, USA.
Insights
Sleep restriction in toddlers significantly impacts their emotional responses. Napping helps young children express more positive emotions and better manage challenging situations.
Area of Science:
- Developmental Psychology
- Sleep Science
- Child Emotion Regulation
Background:
- Early childhood is a critical period for developing sleep and emotion processing skills.
- Sleep disturbances are often first detected in early childhood and linked to psychopathology.
- Most research on sleep and emotion processing has focused on adults, leaving a gap in understanding toddler development.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the effects of acute sleep restriction, specifically nap deprivation, on emotion expression in toddlers.
- To determine how sleep impacts toddlers' ability to process and respond to positive, neutral, and negative stimuli.
- To assess the influence of sleep on emotion regulation during challenging tasks.
Main Methods:
- Ten healthy toddlers (30-36 months old) participated in a controlled sleep study.
- Children underwent two conditions: one with a nap (Nap) and one without (No-Nap), with emotion assessments conducted after each.
- Emotion expression was measured by coding video recordings of children viewing emotion-eliciting pictures and completing puzzles.
Main Results:
- Sleep restriction led to reduced positive emotion displays to positive stimuli and increased negative emotion displays to neutral and negative stimuli.
- Nap deprivation resulted in a 34% decrease in positive responses to a solvable puzzle.
- Sleep restriction also increased negative responses (31%) and decreased confused responses (39%) to an unsolvable puzzle.
Conclusions:
- Sleep plays a crucial role in how toddlers experience and express emotions.
- When sleep-deprived, toddlers show diminished positive engagement and reduced adaptability in challenging situations.
- Consistent insufficient sleep in early childhood may impair emotion regulation, potentially increasing the risk for future emotional and behavioral issues.
Abstract:
Early childhood is a period of dramatic change in sleep and emotion processing, as well as a time when disturbance in both domains are first detected. Although sleep is recognized as central in emotion processing and psychopathology, the great majority of experimental data have been collected in adults. We examined the effects of acute sleep restriction (nap deprivation) on toddlers' emotion expression. Ten healthy children (seven females; 30-36 months old) followed a strict sleep schedule (≥12.5 h time in bed per 24-h) for 5 days, before each of two randomly assigned afternoon emotion assessments following Nap and No-Nap conditions (resulting in an 11-day protocol). Children viewed emotion-eliciting pictures (five positive, three neutral, three negative) and completed puzzles (one solvable, one unsolvable). Children's faces were video-recorded, and emotion displays were coded. When sleep restricted, children displayed less confusion in response to neutral pictures, more negativity to neutral and negative pictures, and less positivity to positive pictures. Sleep restriction also resulted in a 34% reduction in positive emotion responses (solvable puzzle), as well as a 31% increase in negative emotion responses and a 39% decrease in confused responses (unsolvable puzzle). These findings suggest sleep is a key factor in how young children respond to their world. When sleep restricted, toddlers are neither able to take full advantage of positive experiences nor are they as adaptive in challenging contexts. If insufficient sleep consistently 'taxes' young children's emotion responses, they may not manage emotion regulation challenges effectively, potentially placing them at risk for future emotional/behavioral problems.
