Sleep Disruption as an Amplifier of Aggressive Behavior

考虑到攻击行为对个人、人际关系和社会的负面影响，了解导致攻击行为的原因至关重要。虽然研究已经记录了一些诱发条件，可以沉淀攻击性行为，很少有人注意到睡眠不足可能在调节攻击性方面发挥的作用。适当的睡眠是最佳社会和情绪功能的先决条件，睡眠中断越来越常见;然而，它在攻击性等社会行为中的作用在很大程度上是未知的。该项目将测试一个新的理论模型，该模型假定睡眠限制会导致攻击性思想，情绪和行为的增加。这项研究将阐明睡眠限制的重要社会后果，测试这些影响是否是由认知功能的变化驱动的，并最终阐明睡眠中断如何导致社会适应能力受损和行为问题。拟议的研究将测试对睡眠限制的情绪，认知和自我控制反应如何导致攻击性行为。参与者将被随机分配到遵循他们的常规睡眠习惯或在两个工作日内限制他们的睡眠4小时。之后，他们将返回实验室，在那里他们的情绪和行为反应将被检查。一系列实验将研究睡眠限制对愤怒，敌意和攻击性反应的不同测量的潜在后果，以及计划和推理的认知能力。这项研究将使睡眠中断的神经行为影响与复杂的情绪和社会行为之间建立新的联系。最终，考虑到睡眠是一个可改变的风险因素，对睡眠障碍如何影响攻击性的更好的理论和基于过程的理解将为有攻击性行为风险的个体提供更有效的干预策略（例如，犯罪者）和有动机减少攻击性行为的社会机构（例如，学校）。

It is vitally important to understand what leads to aggressive behavior, given the negative impact of aggression on individuals, relationships, and society. While research has documented some eliciting conditions that can precipitate aggressive behavior, there has been little attention paid to the role that a lack of sleep may play in modulating aggression. Proper sleep is a pre-requisite for optimal social and emotional functioning and sleep disruption is increasingly common; however, the role it plays in social behaviors such as aggression is largely unknown. This project will test a novel theoretical model, which posits that sleep restriction can cause increases in aggressive thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. The research will elucidate important social consequences of sleep restriction, test whether the effects are driven by changes in cognitive functioning, and ultimately illuminate how sleep disruption contributes to impaired social adjustment and behavioral problems.The proposed research will test how emotional, cognitive, and self-control responses to sleep restriction may contribute to aggressive behavior. Participants will be randomly assigned to either follow their regular sleep routines or to restrict their sleep by 4 hours over two working days. Afterwards, they will return to the laboratory where their emotional and behavioral responding will be examined. A series of experiments will examine potential consequences of sleep restriction on different measures of anger, hostility, and aggressive responding, as well as cognitive abilities to plan and reason. This research will enable novel linkages of well-established neurobehavioral effects of sleep disruption to complex emotions and social behavior. Ultimately, given that sleep is a modifiable risk factor, a better theoretical and process-based understanding of how aggression is affected by sleep disturbance will enable more effective intervention strategies for individuals at-risk for aggressive behavior (e.g., offenders) and for social institutions motivated to reduce aggressive behavior (e.g., schools).