jp)Association of Sleep Quality and Free Time Leisure Activities inJapanese and British Civil ServantsAli NASERMOADDELI1, Michikazu SEKINE1, Meena KUMARI2, Tarani CHANDOLA2,Michael MARMOT2 and Sadanobu KAGAMIMORI11Department of Welfare Promotion and Epidemiology, Toyama Medical and Pharmaceutical University, Japan and2International Centre for Health and Society, Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, University CollegeLondon, U. K.Abstract:  Association of Sleep Quality and FreeTime Leisure Activities in Japanese and British CivilServants: Ali NASERMOADDELI, et al. Department ofWelfare Promotion and Epidemiology, ToyamaMedical and Pharmaceutical University--Sleepdisturbance as a pervasive health problem can directlyaffect the physical and psychological well-being ofindividuals.See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License
385Ali NASERMOADDELI, et al.: Leisure Activities and Sleep Qualityindex8), were developed to discriminate between goodand poor sleepers and to provide a clinically usefulassessment of a variety of sleep disturbances that mightaffect sleep quality.We  assumed that since leisure time activities areculturally specific, external validity of the results couldbe better interpreted if the study were based on dataderived from populations with distinct cultures.Full details of the screeningexamination for the Whitehall II study are reportedelsewhere9).Income data were not accessible for the participants inthe T city study, and therefore employment categoriesare reported as the socio-economic status.Participants were informed that by answering andreturning the questionnaires, they would be giving us theirinformed consent on data analysis.QuestionnaireWe  used the Japanese version of the Pittsburgh SleepQuality  index  (PSQI-J)10).Therefore, factors that affectsleep quality could also influence the general well-beingof individuals.Daily life pattern contains both positive and negativeconstructs which affect physical and psychological well-being: job stress, effort-reward imbalance, social support,social/leisure  activities,  family-work  interface  andpersonal health behaviors.In this study we assessed whether participating indifferent leisure or free time activities was associated withsleep quality in two populations of civil servants.In thisregard we assessed the association in the two differentsocieties of Japanese and British civil servants.MethodsSubjectsIn this cross-sectional study we evaluated 2,080 civilservants  working  in  departments  related  to  themunicipality of T city in Toyama Prefecture, Japan, inthe spring of 2001.This study was in collaboration withthe Whitehall II study9) which was set up to investigatethe degree and causes of the social gradient in morbidityand mortality in a cohort of civil servants in London.From the Whitehall II civil servants, 6,873 (66.7%)subjects (phase 5, 1997) for whom we had completeinformation on sleep problem scores were entered intothe analysis.Setting a validated cut-off pointof 5.5 for the PSQI-J global score and the upper tertilepoint  for  the  Jenkins'  sleep  problem  scale,  weconducted logistic regression analysis to assess theassociation between leisure time activities and sleepquality.The PSQIgenerates 7 components (range of score 0-3): sleepquality, sleep latency, sleep duration, habitual sleepefficiency, sleep disturbances, use of sleeping medicationand  daytime  dysfunction.Higher scoresindicate poorer sleep quality.