The causal relationship between depression and sleep quality among college freshmen: A cross-lagged regression analysis with big data

The causal relationship between depression and sleep quality is remains unexplored. Cross-lagged analysis was conducted from 322 first-year nonclinical students at Time 1 and Time 2 with a 4-month interval, using SPSS 26 and Mplus 8.0 to examine the relationships among the variables. The analysis of data indicated that depression positively correlated with sleep quality at Time 1 (T1) and Time 2 (T2) (r = 0.36, 0.47, p < 0.01). The results disclosed depression on time 1 impact time 2 in significant way (β = 0.646, p < 0.001). The T1 PSQI score was positively related with T2 PSQI (β = 0.121, p < 0.05), and T1 depression was positively related with the T2 PSQI (β = 0.121, p < 0.05). Nevertheless, T1 PSQI score was not significantly correlated with T2 depression (β = 0.032, p > 0.05). Our discovery of the causal relationship of depression on quality of sleep offers guidance for the treatment of sleep issues in psychological counseling practice.