Overview: Title, Abstract, and Purpose
The article by Matricciani et al. (2018) is an original study focused on researching sleep as a multidimensional construct by examining all the characteristics of sleep and their connections with health. The authors argue that sleep deserves to be considered a part of daily-spectrum activities and suggest innovative statistical models as a viable approach to analyzing sleep paradigms. The article’s introduction aligns with its title and abstract and logically leads to the purpose of the study. Matricciani et al. (2018) determine their purpose as presenting a rationale and a methodology for “conceptualizing sleep both as a multidimensional construct and as a component of daily time use” (p. 340). The analysis of the article allows the conclusion that the authors have managed to pursue their goal in a logical way and have presented their findings consistently.
Methods: Approaches to Sleep Research
When investigating sleep as a multidimensional construct, the authors utilize three ways to locate links between sleep and health. The first approach is examining additive associations of various sleep characteristics (Matricciani et al., 2018). The second method is creating a composite sleep score to compute sleep characteristics and create an index of overall good sleep. The third method involves analyzing sleep profiles within different people. Matricciani et al. (2018) investigate the set of questions using statistical methods. The authors mention the approach they have followed and provide an explanation of their statistical methods so that other researchers could duplicate the study.
Results: Findings and Interpretations
The results of the study support the authors’ initial stance concerning the importance of including sleep in the daily-spectrum activities defining people’s health patterns. The graphs utilized by the authors are appropriate, and they add to the text rather than merely repeat what is said in the text. There is a full-page example of compositional data analysis (CoDA) to make it clear to other researchers how the selected statistical model can be used as a method for analyzing sleep paradigms. The scholars provide detailed explanations of the model, ratios, and analyses, enabling readers to see how the model can be applied.
Discussion
The authors were ultimately able to answer the question raised. Matricciani et al.’s (2018) research provided a new understanding of the phenomenon of sleep and its links with health. The reported observations support those made by other researchers. The authors consistently refer to the scholars and work on whose frameworks their article is based. However, they also thoroughly explain how their novel approaches are working. Matricciani et al. (2018) admit that their study is not void of limitations, mentioning that accelerometers are “unable to distinguish between different types of sedentary behaviors,” which may be crucial in sleep research (p. 347). Suggesting future research directions in the field adds validity and value to the article.
Structure
The structure of the article fits science norms, starting with an abstract and introduction and then moving to a review of literature, analysis, discussion, and conclusions. While the study was published in 2018, it is cited in 88 other research articles, which signifies its importance. Other scholars have cited Matricciani et al.’s (2018) study mostly in the literature review section (Antczak et al., 2020; Dumuid et al., 2020; Yang et al., 2022). However, the diversity of directions in which the article is used allows the conclusion that it is helpful in its field. For instance, the article by Dumuid et al. (2020) focuses on CoDA, the main analytical tool Matricciani et al. (2018) utilized. Therefore, despite some minor limitations, the article by Matricciani et al. (2018) is a valuable research study as it considers a question with important social and medical implications.
References
Antczak, D., Lonsdale, C., Lee, J., Hilland, T., Duncan, M., Cruz, B. d. P., Hulteen, R. M., Parker, P. D., & Sanders, T. (2020). Physical activity and sleep are inconsistently related in healthy children: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Sleep Medicine Reviews, 51. Web.
Dumuid, D., Pedišić, Ž., Palarea-Albaladejo, J., Martín-Fernández, J. A., Hron, K., & Olds, T. (2020). Compositional data analysis in time-use epidemiology: What, why, how. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 17(7). Web.
Matricciani, L., Bin, Y. S., Lallukka, T., Kronholm, E., Wake, M., Paquet, C., Dumuid, D., & Olds, T. (2018). Rethinking the sleep-health link. Sleep Health, 4(4), 339-348. Web.
Yang, Z., Zhu, Z., Wang, C., Zhang, F., & Zeng, H. (2022). Association between adverse perinatal outcomes and sleep disturbances during pregnancy: A systematic review and meta-analysis. The Journal of Maternal-Fetal & Neonatal Medicine, 35(1), 166-174. Web.