State-level structural racism and sleep disturbances among Black and Latinx adolescents: Findings from the adolescent brain cognitive development study.

Abstract

Objective: Existing research highlights interpersonal ethnic-racial discrimination as a contributing factor to sleep disparities among ethnic-racial minoritized adolescents. However, limited research has examined the impact of structural racism, the root cause of interpersonal discrimination, on sleep disturbances. The current study examined how structural racism within the state where an adolescent resided influenced sleep disturbances among ethnic-racial minoritized adolescents, both conjointly and interactively with their experiences of interpersonal discrimination.

Method: Drawing on longitudinal data from Black and non-White Latinx adolescents in the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development study, path analysis was conducted to examine how state-level structural racism predicted sleep disturbances and moderated the association between interpersonal discrimination and sleep disturbances. We further explored how these effects varied by demographic factors of ethnicity-race, immigration status, and family socioeconomic status. Separate analyses were conducted for male and female adolescents.

Results: Structural racism directly predicted more sleep disturbances subsequently for male adolescents; structural racism exacerbated the positive association between interpersonal discrimination and female adolescents' sleep disturbances. These effects were more pronounced for non-White Latinx (vs. Black) adolescents, adolescents from immigrant (vs. nonimmigrant) families, and for adolescents with lower (vs. higher) family socioeconomic status.

Conclusion: The findings highlight state-level structural racism as a feasible and promising target for systemic change and policy reform to improve the sleep health of ethnic-racial minoritized adolescents and promote health equity. Findings also provided valuable insights in terms of what and for whom future research and intervention efforts should target to mitigate the sleep disturbances linked to structural racism. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).