Abstract
One questionnaire about a typical week's sleep is more convenient than asking individuals to complete daily sleep diaries. Yet, most clinical evaluations and much sleep and insomnia research rely upon self monitoring via daily sleep diaries. These are often problematic to administer and can be reactive. Therefore, we investigated comparability of two measurement modalities (self monitoring and questionnaire) in a sample of 156 community dwelling older adults, both good and poor sleepers. Results indicate significant and high correlations between corresponding scores on a retrospective sleep questionnaire and on 7 days of self monitoring on a daily sleep diary, thereby suggesting that the two measurement modalities are tapping the same domains. There were, however, significant differences between means on several variables, but there was no systematic pattern to the differences. These findings illustrate the need to tailor measurement modality—retrospective or ongoing—to the setting and the purpose of the evaluation.
Similar content being viewed by others
REFERENCES
Babkoff, H., Weller, A., and Lavidor, M. (1995). A comparison of prospective and retrospective assessments of sleep. J. Clin. Epidemiol. 48: 1-9.
Bootzin, R. R., Bell, I. R., Habisch, R., Kuo, T., Wyatt, J. K., Roder, S. P., and Manber, R. (1995). Night-to-night variability in measures of sleep and sleep disorders: A six night PSG study. In Proceedings of 9th Annual Meeting of the APSS, Rochester, MN, APSS.
Edinger, J. D., Marsh, G. R., McCall, W. V., Erwin, C. W., and Lininger, A. W. (1991). Sleep variability across consecutive nights of home monitoring in older mixed DIMS patients. Sleep 14: 13-17.
Fichten, C. S., Creti, L., Amsel, R., Brender, W., Weinstein, N., and Libman, E. (1995). Poor sleepers who do not complain of insomnia: Myths and realities about psychological and lifestyle characteristics of older good and poor sleepers. J. Behav. Med. 18(2): 189-223.
Fichten, C. S., Libman, E., Amsel, R., Creti, L., Weinstein, N., Rothenberg, P., Liederman, G., and Brender, W. (1991). Evaluation of the sexual consequences of surgery: Retrospective and prospective strategies. J. Behav. Med. 14(3): 267-285.
Fichten, C. S., Libman, E., Bailes, S., and Alapin, I. (2000). Characteristics of older adults with insomnia. In Lichstein, K. L., and Morin, C. M. (eds.), Treatment of Late Life Insomnia, Sage, New York, pp. 37-79.
Lacks, P. (1987). Behavioral Treatment for Persistent Insomnia, Pergamon Press, New York.
Lacks, P. (1988). Daily sleep diary. In Hersen, M., and Bellack, A. S. (eds.), Dictionary of Behavioral Assessment Techniques, Pergamon, New York, pp. 162-164.
Libman, E., Creti, L., Amsel, R., Brender, W., and Fichten, C. S. (1997). What do older good and poor sleepers do during periods of nocturnal wakefulness? The Sleep Behaviors Scale: 60C. Psychology and Aging 12(1): 170-182.
Mahoney, M. J. (1977). Some applied issues in self monitoring. In Cone, J. D., and Hawkins, R. P. (eds.), Behavioral Assessment: New Directions in Clinical Psychology, Brunner/Mazel, New York, pp. 241-254.
Standards of Practice Committee of the American Sleep Disorders Association. (1995). Practice parameters for the use of polysomnography in the evaluation of insomnia. Sleep 18: 55-57.
Tarrier, N., Sommerfield, C., Reynolds, M., and Pilgrim, H. (1999). Symptom self monitoring in the treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder. Behav. Ther. 30: 597-606.
Wohlgemuth, W. K., Edinger, J. D., Fins, A. I., Sullivan, R. J., Jr. (1999). How many nights are enough? The short-term stability of sleep parameters in elderly insomniacs and normal sleepers. Psychophysiology 36: 233-244.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Libman, E., Fichten, C.S., Bailes, S. et al. Sleep Questionnaire Versus Sleep Diary: Which Measure Is Better?. International Journal of Rehabilitation and Health 5, 205–209 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1012955423123
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1012955423123