{"id":1473,"date":"2026-07-20T19:20:06","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T19:20:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/?p=1473"},"modified":"2026-07-20T19:20:06","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T19:20:06","slug":"out-of-sync-and-overlooked-relationship-between-social-jetlag-and-anxiety-in-adolescents-systematic-review-and-meta-analysis-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/2026\/07\/20\/out-of-sync-and-overlooked-relationship-between-social-jetlag-and-anxiety-in-adolescents-systematic-review-and-meta-analysis-2026\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cOut of Sync and Overlooked\u201d \u2013 Relationship between Social Jetlag and Anxiety in Adolescents: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis (2026)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Authors: <\/strong>Hannah Ravenhall, Alessio Bellato, Sarah L. Chellappa and Matthew Garner<br \/>\n<strong>Published:<\/strong> 2026<br \/>\n<strong>Publication:<\/strong> <span data-olk-copy-source=\"MessageBody\">Sleep Medicine Reviews<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"background-color: #f2f2f2;padding: 10px\">Anxiety is the most prevalent mental health difficulty in adolescence, a period characterised by a shift towards an eveningness chronotype that is not aligned with societal demands (i.e., school start times). Experiencing \u201csocial jetlag\u201d (SJL), a discrepancy in weekday-weekend sleep timing, is proposed to be associated with increased anxiety. A PRISMA-compliant systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted to investigate the relationship between SJL and anxiety in adolescents (age range: 12-18 years). Systematic searches were conducted in PsycINFO, Web of Science, Embase, PubMed, MEDLINE, and ProQuest Dissertations &amp; Theses Global on 14th November 2024 to retrieve empirical studies analysing the relationship between SJL and anxiety in 12-18-year-olds. A multi-level random-effect meta-analysis was conducted in R to estimate the magnitude of the association between SJL and anxiety. After screening 2,138 records, 18 studies were included in the systematic review, with 12 included in the meta-analysis (235,526 participants in total) and six in a narrative review. A small association was found between increased SJL and more severe anxiety (Fisher\u2019s z = 0.0614, 95% CI [0.0268, 0.0961], p = 0.0011). These findings highlight the importance of addressing behavioural strategies targeting healthy regular sleep as a tool to improve mental health in adolescence.<\/p>\n<p>Ravenhall, H., Bellato, A., Chellappa, S. L. and Garner, M. (2026) \u201cOut of Sync and Overlooked\u201d \u2013 Relationship between Social Jetlag and Anxiety in Adolescents: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. <em>Sleep Medicine Reviews.<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1016\/j.smrv.2026.102345\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1016\/j.smrv.2026.102345<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1016\/j.smrv.2026.102345\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Download (open access article)<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Authors: Hannah Ravenhall, Alessio Bellato, Sarah L. Chellappa and Matthew Garner Published: 2026 Publication: Sleep Medicine Reviews Anxiety is the most prevalent mental health difficulty in adolescence, a period characterised by a shift towards an eveningness chronotype that is not &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/2026\/07\/20\/out-of-sync-and-overlooked-relationship-between-social-jetlag-and-anxiety-in-adolescents-systematic-review-and-meta-analysis-2026\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":58097,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[259591,1003923],"tags":[1003886,1003951,4054],"class_list":["post-1473","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anxiety","category-sleep","tag-published-article","tag-systematic-literature-review","tag-thesis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/58097"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1473"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1473\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1474,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1473\/revisions\/1474"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/edpsych\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}