Factors affecting weekday-to-weekend sleep differences among Korean adolescent students: Focus on extracurricular tutoring time

OBJECTIVES: Discrepancy in weekday-weekend sleep induces negative effects on physical health, obesity, psychological disorders, and academic performance; this particularly affects adolescent students through extracurricular tutoring, including evening self-study, private tutoring, and home studies. The present research aimed to clarify sociodemographic and economic factors, including extracurricular tutoring time, associated with weekday-to-weekend sleep differences using longitudinal data. STUDY DESIGN: Data from the Korean Children and Youth Panel Survey (KCYPS) data were analyzed. Weekday-to-weekend sleep differences and extracurricular tutoring, as well as other covariates, were measured using adolescent’s self-report questionnaires. Multilevel regression and structural equation modeling (SEM) of repeated measures were used to test the hypothesized relationship between variables. RESULTS: The time spent in weekly extracurricular tutoring was negatively associated with weekday-to-weekend sleep differences. However, increased tutoring time was positively associated with bedtime, and bedtime was in turn positively associated with differences in Korean adolescents’ weekday-to-weekend sleep patterns. The SEM analysis result showed a significant indirect effect of tutoring time on sleep differences via bedtime. CONCLUSIONS: Limiting weekly extracurricular tutoring time is important to early bedtime and reducing weekday-to-weekend sleep pattern differences. Policymakers should develop alternatives to private tutoring to improve the sleep duration and reduce weekday-to-weekend sleep differences among adolescents.