Boredom affects sleep quality: The serial mediation effect of inattention and bedtime procrastination

Boredom has received much research attention in procrastination research, but it has been rarely studied in the context of bedtime procrastination. In the present study, we examined a serial mediation model and hypothesized that the association between boredom and poor sleep quality could be mediated serially by inattention and bedtime procrastination. Boredom was measured as boredom proneness, fidgeting, and mind wandering. We conducted a correlational study on a sample of 270 participants (women = 198, men = 72) aged between 18 and 69 (M = 22.39, SD = 5.41). The analysis with boredom proneness as the predictor showed that boredom proneness predicted inattention, which in turn was associated with increased bedtime procrastination and subsequently poorer sleep quality. However, the analyses with fidgeting and mind wandering as predictors did not yield significant serial mediation effects. Rather, fidgeting and mind wandering, respectively, were associated with poor sleep quality indirectly via bedtime procrastination only. The findings shed light on how boredom affects bedtime procrastination and brought important implications to the interventions in dealing with bedtime procrastination.