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Impaired sleep is a symptom of multiple child psychiatry disorders (e.g., ADHD and mood and anxiety disorders), and clinicians use sleep problems as an item for diagnosis and for examining treatment effects. However, we do not know the accuracy of parental reports of their children’s sleep. Two researchers use different techniques to compare actigraphic measures, questionnaire responses, and parental reports of sleep.
Hvolby et al. compared parental reports of sleep and results from actigraphic measures in 216 children (age range, 6–12 years); 45 children had ADHD, 64 had other psychiatric diagnoses, and 97 children were healthy controls. No child was taking stimulants. Parental reports of sleep onset latency differed significantly from acti…