We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
A self-help book is better than sleep hygiene advice for insomnia: A randomized controlled comparative study.
- Authors
BJORVATN, BJØRN; FISKE, ELDBJØRG; PALLESEN, STÅLE
- Abstract
Bjorvatn, B., Fiske, E. & Pallesen, S. (2011). A self-help book is better than sleep hygiene advice for insomnia: A randomized controlled comparative study. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology 52, 580-585. The objective was to compare the effects of two types of written material for insomnia in a randomized trial with follow-up after three months. Insomniacs were recruited through newspaper advertisements to a web-based survey with validated questionnaires about sleep, anxiety, depression, and use of sleep medications. A self-help book focusing on cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia was compared to standard sleep hygiene advice; 77 and 78 participants were randomized to self-help book or sleep hygiene advice, respectively. The response rate was 81.9%. The self-help book gave significantly better scores on the sleep questionnaires compared to sleep hygiene advice. The proportion using sleep medications was reduced in the self-help book group, whereas it was increased in the sleep hygiene group. Compared to pre-treatment, the self-help book improved scores on the sleep (effect sizes 0.61-0.62) and depression (effect size 0.18) scales, whereas the sleep hygiene advice improved scores on some sleep scales (effect sizes 0.24-0.28), but worsened another (effect size -0.36). In addition, sleep hygiene advice increased the number of days per week where they took sleep medications (effect size -0.50). To conclude, in this randomized controlled trial, the self-help book improved sleep and reduced the proportion using sleep medications compared to sleep hygiene advice. The self-help book is an efficient low-threshold intervention, which is cheap and easily available for patients suffering from insomnia. Sleep hygiene advice also improved sleep at follow-up, but increased sleep medication use. Thus, caution is warranted when sleep hygiene advice are given as a single treatment.
- Subjects
INSOMNIA treatment; SLEEP disorders treatment; ANALYSIS of variance; BOOKS; CHI-squared test; COGNITIVE therapy; QUESTIONNAIRES; SCALES (Weighing instruments); STATISTICAL hypothesis testing; T-test (Statistics); U-statistics; EFFECT sizes (Statistics); RANDOMIZED controlled trials; DATA analysis software
- Publication
Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 2011, Vol 52, Issue 6, p580
- ISSN
0036-5564
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1111/j.1467-9450.2011.00902.x