Racial, ethnic and gender disparities have been found among a variety of health variables, but to date no study has comprehensively examined whether similar differences exist between sleep variables such as duration, efficiency and quality, in early adolescence. There is a general consensus among previous literature that adolescence is a time when a decrease in total sleep time and an increase in sleep problems are observed. Previous literature, however, mainly focused on the influence of puberty to explain these changes. the current study examined if differences exist between 1462 Caucasian, Hispanic/Latino, and African American early adolescents (ages 10-14 years) on sleep duration, efficiency and quality. Results showed that adolescent boys reported significantly longer sleep durations, better sleep quality, shorter sleep onset latencies, and later rise times than girls. Results also showed that sixth graders slept longer than seventh and eighth graders, and that seventh graders woke up much earlier than the other two grades. Lastly, results showed that Caucasian students reported longer sleep onset latencies and lower sleep efficiencies than African American students. Trends were observed for boys having greater sleep efficiencies than girls and for Caucasian students sleeping longer than Hispanic students. Based on the differences observed in our sample, introducing sleep education in middle school is discussed.

The objective of my diploma work is to point out the main trends of the healthy lifestyle as well as to stress the factors having a negative impact on health. In particular, the work deals with well-balanced nutrition, exercising, sleep, lifestyle health risks, stress, civilisation disorders and the media which promote this healthy lifestyle. The research has been carried out under the use of the questionnaire method analysing the lifestyle of two separate groups of adolescents.