Portuguese College Students’ Perceptions of Barriers to Healthy Sleep and Strategies to Overcome Them: A Mix Method Study

Poor sleep negatively influences college students’ health and school performance. Sleep and the behaviors that take place during the day are interrelated; as such, the aim of this work was to investigate the psycho-social-environmental factors in college life that may affect students’ sleep, using a mixed-method approach, with a view to informing the design of research-informed sleep-promotion initiatives. Six focus group interviews were conducted with 25 college students (18–36 years old) from different areas of study and degree levels. Participants kept sleep diaries for a week prior to their interview and filled in a sleep health questionnaire. Students exhibited a fair level of sleep health, scoring their lowest mean values in sleep irregularity. Sleep diaries revealed a positive relationship between coffee drinking and sleep quality and a negative association between physical activity and sleep quality. Three main themes emerged through a thematic analysis: the importance of sleep , how students sleep , and how students can sleep better . Students have reported postponing their sleep in favor of other activities, which results in irregular bedtimes. Commuting, more autonomous study, long class hours, and the allure of socializing were obstacles to sleep. Living with peers, without parental supervision, may even be more detrimental to a good sleep. Students evidenced having considerable knowledge about sleep and mentioned several strategies to deal with thoughts and emotions before bedtime. Nevertheless, students feel that the promotion of sleep should be a social endeavor, calling for a paradigm shift in the value that the college setting attributes to sleep.