Mapping insomnia symptoms and circadian preferences to mental health problems in men and women across the lifespan

•Circadian preferences and insomnia symptoms can be used to classify the general population.•“Sleepless Doves” report the most severe insomnia symptoms, but not the latest circadian preferences.•“Sleepy Owls” and “Sleepless Doves” have more severe mental health problems than “Healthy Larks".•Unlike other problems, substance use in “Sleepless Doves” is not higher than in “Sleepy Owls”.•These relationships apply to men and women, but weaken with age. This study identified subgroups in the general population based on combinations in three night-time insomnia symptoms and four dimensions of circadian preferences ("sleep profiles") and investigated the associations between sleep profiles and nine common mental health problems. The data came from the Lifelines cohort add-on study “Comorbid Conditions of ADHD” and included 37,716 individuals (aged 4-91 years) from the Dutch general population who completed a digital survey. Latent profile analysis was used to identify sleep profiles in twelve age-sex subgroups. Linear regression was used to investigate whether sleep profiles differ in mental health problems. Participants were classified into three sleep profiles: "Healthy Larks", who had early circadian preferences and no insomnia symptoms; "Sleepy Owls” with late circadian preferences and nonrestorative sleep; and "Sleepless Doves" with intermediate circadian preferences and severe insomnia symptoms. Compared to “Healthy Larks”, all mental health problems were significantly more severe in “Sleepy Owls” and even worse in “Sleepless Doves”. These associations were similar in men and women but weakened with age. However, “Sleepy Owls” and “Sleepless Doves” did not differ in heavy alcohol drinking, drug use, and smoking. Our findings strengthened the evidence for the universal role of healthy sleep in mental wellbeing.