The impact of prior day sleep and physical activity on the cortisol awakening response

Travis Anderson; Gail Corneau; Laurie Wideman; Kari Eddington; Suzanne Vrshek-Schallhorn

doi:10.1016/j.psyneuen.2021.105131

The impact of prior day sleep and physical activity on the cortisol awakening response

Psychoneuroendocrinology. 2021 Apr:126:105131. doi: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2021.105131. Epub 2021 Jan 14.

Authors

Travis Anderson¹, Gail Corneau², Laurie Wideman³, Kari Eddington², Suzanne Vrshek-Schallhorn⁴

Affiliations

¹ Department of Kinesiology, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC, USA. Electronic address: t_ander2@uncg.edu.
² Department of Psychology, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC, USA.
³ Department of Kinesiology, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC, USA.
⁴ Department of Psychology, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC, USA. Electronic address: suzanne.schallhorn@uncg.edu.

PMID: 33493753
DOI: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2021.105131

Abstract

The cortisol awakening response (CAR) describes the increase in cortisol within the first 30-60 min after waking from nocturnal sleep, and is a common biomarker used within psychoneuroendocrinology, but the effect of sleep on the CAR is currently unclear. A previous study suggested that reported discrepancies may be due to other lifestyle behaviors such as physical activity; given the role of the CAR in energy regulation and preparation for the day, it is theoretically plausible that activity level would influence the CAR. However, no study has yet utilized objective monitoring of day-to-day sleep and physical activity to investigate potential effects on the CAR. This study aimed to test the hypotheses that either sleep duration or sleep quality would interact with the prior 24 h' physical activity to predict the CAR on the following morning. Salivary samples were collected from 85 young adults (mean = 19.1 years, SD = 1.89) immediately after waking from nocturnal sleep and again 30 min after waking; two complete and consecutive days were used. Participants wore accelerometers (ActiGraph, wGT3X-BT) throughout this phase of a larger study, which provided objective measures of sleep duration, number of awakenings, and amount of physical activity. Mixed-effects models with post-hoc regions of significance decompositions tested the hypothesized interaction effects. Results demonstrated a significant interaction between prior day sleep duration and physical activity predicting the next day CAR, wherein short sleep duration and high levels of physical activity resulted in an augmented CAR. Although more sleep clearly predicted a smaller next day CAR in main effect, this study provides additional support that sleep duration effects are also moderated by prior day physical activity. Both behavioral factors should be considered when assessing the CAR and the association between the CAR other psychoneuroendocrine outcomes.

Keywords: Actigraphy; Cortisol awakening response; Exercise.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Circadian Rhythm
Exercise
Humans
Hydrocortisone* / metabolism
Saliva
Sleep
Sleep Quality*
Wakefulness*
Young Adult

Substances

Hydrocortisone