Sleep deprivation and the development of leadership and need for cognition during the college years

The epidemic of sleep deprivation among college students is alarming. Prior studies of college students' sleep deprivation have focused on academic outcomes and mental health problems. This study considers the impact of college students' sleep deprivation on two key, developmental outcomes: leadership and need for cognition.

This study is a secondary analysis of longitudinal data from the Wabash National Study of Liberal Arts Education (N = 3,690), using random-effects and fixed-effects models to estimate the association between chronic sleep deprivation from freshman year to senior year and developmental outcomes.

Results from the random-effects model show that chronic sleep deprivation is negatively associated with lower scores in leadership skills (β=-.09P<.001) and need for cognition (β=-.08P<.001), after accounting for potential confounders. Results from the fixed-effects model that accounts for time-invariant unobserved variables show similar patterns for leadership skills (β=-.09P<.01) and need for cognition (β=-.06P<.01).

This study demonstrates that chronic sleep deprivation has consequences for critical skills, suggesting that steps to promote college students' sleep health may also enhance their positive development in leadership skills and need for cognition.