Emotion
Does bad sleep and mood make pain feel worse?
Open access · cc by · source: Europe PMC
Interrupted sleep slightly increases how intensely people feel pain, but induced positive or negative moods do not change this effect.
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Does bad sleep and mood make pain feel worse?
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35 participants in the final sample
The final sample comprised 35 adults (16 men and 19 women) ranging from 19 to 26 years old (mean age 21.8).
80 minutes between phone call awakenings
The participants were awakened by phone calls every 80 min (6 times during the night) and were at each occasion instructed to stay awake for at least 10 min.
Key findings
Interrupting sleep led to a small but statistically significant increase in how intensely participants felt cold pain, though it did not change how long they could tolerate the cold. Additionally, the experimental changes in mood did not alter pain ratings or influence the connection between sleep loss and pain sensitivity.
Methodology
The researchers tested a group of 35 healthy young adults. Participants underwent a session of undisturbed sleep and another session where their sleep was interrupted by phone calls every 80 minutes, forcing them to remain awake for at least 10 minutes during each awakening. The morning after, researchers induced positive or negative emotions using videos and facial posturing, then measured the participants' responses to painful pressure and cold water.
Limitations
The study was limited by its small sample of 35 healthy young adults, which makes it difficult to apply these findings directly to clinical populations suffering from long-term chronic pain. Because the researchers disrupted sleep for only one night, the study does not capture the cumulative, long-term effects of sleep loss that build up over weeks. Furthermore, repeating the pain tests multiple times might have allowed participants to develop coping mechanisms, potentially masking the full impact of sleep loss on pain threshold.
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