Self-Reported Sleep Quality in Late Pregnancy Is Associated With Early-Childhood Growth Trajectories in Children Aged...

Maternal sleep health during pregnancy has been linked to children's physical growth. Understanding its effects on early childhood growth trajectories could help mitigate the impacts on children's metabolic health. This study aims to evaluate whether late-pregnancy sleep quality is associated with children's weight trajectories from age 0 to 2 years.

This study used 2015-2026 data from 645 mother-child pairs in a prospective pregnancy cohort conducted in Los Angeles; analyses were performed in 2025-2026. Late-pregnancy sleep quality was assessed using the Jenkins Sleep Scale (range: 0-20). Early childhood weight and length were abstracted from medical records or measured during follow-up visits from ages 0 to 2 years. Weight trajectories as a function of age, with and without adjustment for Jenkins Sleep Scale, were estimated using generalized additive mixed models.

This study included 645 mother-child pairs with a mean (SD) maternal age of 28.8 (5.9) years at study entry, and 51.5% of the children were female. Most mothers reported mild to moderate sleep disturbance (mean [SD] Jenkins Sleep Scale=8.0 [5.5]). Children whose mothers had poor sleep quality (≥75th percentile Jenkins Sleep Scale) had lower weight at the age of 0-6 months and greater growth thereafter, leading to significantly higher weights from ages 1 to 2 years than in children whose mothers had good sleep quality (25th percentile Jenkins Sleep Scale). Comparing children whose mothers had 90th percentile with those mothers had 25th percentile Jenkins Sleep Scale, at age 1 year, the difference in weight was 346.7 g (95% CI=102.3, 591.1 g), and the highest differences were observed at the age of 17 months (751.5 g, 95% CI=432.0, 1,070.9). Associations differed substantially by sex and preterm status but were not affected by childhood feeding practices.

Poor late-pregnancy sleep quality was associated with different growth trajectories between ages 0 and 2, characterized by lower early weight status followed by accelerated growth and higher weight by ages 1-2.