Christina Mu

• Bachelor of Arts
• PhD Student at University of South Florida

Objectives: Previous studies have focused on the role of mindfulness in improving sleep health. Sleep health may also increase daily mindfulness; however, this potential directionality is understudied, with a lack of research on healthcare workers who need high-quality sleep and mindful attention for patient care. This study examined whether sleep...

Objectives: Back pain and poor mental health are interrelated issues in older men. Evidence suggests that socioeconomic status moderates this relationship, but less is known about the role of subjective social status (SSS). This study examined if the association between back pain and mental health is moderated by SSS. Method: We used a sample of c...

Experimental studies have shown that sleep deprivation may lead to worse performance on cognitive tests. However, few studies have considered how sleep is associated with perceived cognitive performance in the daily lives of hospital nurses who require high cognitive abilities to deliver high‐quality patient care. The current study examined the rel...

Background: Mandated social distancing practices and quarantines in response to COVID-19 have resulted in challenges for research on healthcare workers, such as hospital nurses. It remains unknown whether nursing studies utilizing complex methodology like sleep actigraphy and ecological momentary assessment (EMA) can be conducted remotely without...

Objective. Sensory impairments (SI) are associated with comorbidities, functional difficulties, and poor self-rated health. Few studies have examined associations between SI and pain, which is a strong correlate of poor health in later life. We examined the associations between SI and pain. Methods. We used cross-sectional data from the 2021 Nation...

Work may influence the home domain and subsequently impact employee sleep. Past work found that negative spillover mediated the relationship between perceived unfairness about work and insomnia symptoms across 20 years. As an extension of past work, this study investigated whether negative spillover and positive spillover mediate the relationship b...

Objetivo: A pesar de la popularidad de la atención plena en las investigaciones y las intervenciones, falta información sobre cómo y por qué la atención plena puede beneficiar la salud del sueño de los empleados. A partir de la teoría de la regulación de las emociones, evaluamos la rumia afectiva, el afecto negativo y el afecto positivo como mecani...

Public health and safety are facing increasingly severe threats from natural disasters, infectious diseases, and emergencies caused by human actions, both intentional and unintentional. These incidents now impact a larger number of people and cover broader geographical areas compared to the past. Chief among those most affected are older people, as...

With the rapidly growing aging population, we are faced with an increasingly diverse population of older people. In the 2023 MedPac Report, the Commission found that health disparities by race/ethnicity and income persist. Black Medicare beneficiaries and people with low-income subsidies are at higher risk of poor health outcomes (e.g., increase ho...

Black adults have higher risk for cardiovascular disease (CVD) compared to their White counterparts. Biopsychosocial frameworks suggest that this racial difference may not only be due to higher stressor exposure (e.g., discrimination) but also to stressor reactivity (i.e., heightened automatic reactions to stressors). This study examined if racial...

Negative and positive work experiences may spillover to the home domain and harm one’s sleep. This study investigated whether work-to-family spillover mediates the relationship between work characteristics and sleep health. Full-time workers (n=2,106) from the Midlife in the United States Study provided Time-1 data (T1: 2004-2006); a sub-set (n=1,4...

Amidst the introduction of breakthroughs to slow the progression of Alzheimer’s Disease, hesitation remains among people living with dementia and their care partners. Currently, over 7 million Americans are impacted by Alzheimer’s Disease and another 11 million Americans provide unpaid care for someone living with the disease. Despite the immense e...

Researchers have posited that healthcare workers (HCWs) are at greater risk of sleep and pain concerns due to their demanding work schedules and stressful workplace environment. Currently, more research is needed to understand the joint associations between sleep and pain and differences by work status and occupation type. This study examined the i...

Background Having multiple sleep problems is common in adulthood. Yet, most studies have assessed single sleep variables at one timepoint, potentially misinterpreting health consequences of co-occurring sleep problems that may change over time. We investigated the relationship between multidimensional sleep health across adulthood and mortality. M...

Chronic stress is associated with negative health outcomes, including poorer cognition. Some studies found stress from caregiving associated with worse cognitive functioning; however, findings are mixed. The present study examined the relationship between caregiving, caregiving strain, and cognitive functioning. We identified participants in the Re...

Objectives. This study tested the longitudinal relationship between back pain and mental health and examined the moderating role of subjective social status (SSS). Method. Community-dwelling older men from the MrOS Study provided four study visits of data collected between 2000-2016 (15,975 observations nested within 5,979 participants). Back pain...

This study investigated whether sleep quality mediates the relationship between race/SES and biomarkers (CRP, IL6, IL10, TNF-α). Participants in the Midlife in the United States Study (n=1,689; Mage=53.02) completed the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index and provided information on eight life-course indicators to measure SES. Black individuals and thos...

Negative consequences of sleep health problems are common in middle-age but poorly understood. This study investigated multidimensional sleep health in middle adulthood and mortality risk. Participants from the Midlife in the United States Study reported sleep characteristics in 2004-2006 (T1; n=9,640, Mage=52.72) and again in 2013-2016 (T2; n=4,33...

Sleep health during midlife sets the stage for health over the lifespan. Mindfulness, or present-moment awareness and attention, is shown to benefit sleep, yet mechanisms explaining these benefits are missing. Applying self-regulation theory, we test affective and cognitivemechanisms linking mindfulness to quantitative and qualitative sleep health....

Previous studies have established a connection between higher mindfulness and cognitive abilities; however, few studies have considered the mechanism underlying this relationship. The cognitive benefit of mindfulness may be through reduced fatigue and daytime sleepiness. This study examined if higher, naturally occurring mindfulness is associated w...

Ecological momentary assessment (EMA) can capture how sleep, stress, and well-being are related within individuals. However, the use of EMA involves participant burden, which may be a major barrier when studying at-risk populations like frontline workers. To guide future research interested in using EMA, this study examined variance components in s...

Poor sleep health is a risk factor for and a common symptom of dementia. Music has been shown to improve sleep across a wide range of clinical and community populations. However, it is unclear whether and to what extent music interventions may also help alleviate sleep problems in people with dementia. This systematic review is the first review exa...

Objective: Poorer sleep quality and insufficient sleep increase the risk of physical pain. The current study examined the daily associations between sleep and physical pain symptoms and tested the moderating role of trait and state mindfulness in this relationship. Methods: Sixty hospital nurses (Mage=35.4 ± 11.8 years) completed 14-day ecological...

We examined whether subjectively and objectively measured sleep health composites have a relationship with heart disease. 6,820 adults (Mage = 53.4 years) from the Midlife in the United States study provided self-reported sleep characteristics and heart disease history. A smaller sample (n = 663) provided actigraphy sleep data. We tested two sleep...

The COVID-19 pandemic has created challenges and opportunities for research. This is especially true for research on essential workers, such as hospital nurses. In adaptation to the pandemic, the current study aimed to assess the feasibility and acceptability of a fully remote study to collect data on psychological and behavioral measures such as d...

The study examined the mediating role of subjective and perseverative cognition on sleep and work impairment. Sixty nurses completed a background survey and 14-days of ecological momentary assessments (EMA) and sleep actigraphy. Each day, participants evaluated their subjective cognition (mental sharpness, memory, processing speed), perseverative c...

Nightly sleep impacts next-day alertness and cognitive functioning. For healthcare professions, work impairment can be life-threatening for patients. Thus, understanding how sleep affects work quality is imperative to promoting medical safety and overall health of workers. The current study investigated whether nightly sleep health is associated wi...

The health behavior model proposes that healthy/unhealthy behaviors may play a role in the relationship between personality and health. Previous research shows that personality traits are linked to sleep, however, few studies have considered the moderating role of unhealthy behaviors in the personality—sleep relationship. The current study investig...

Previous research indicates poor sleep and cognitive functioning are associated. Studies have yet to consider the role of work shift on this relationship. The current study examined the sleep and subjective cognition relationship in nurses, and if this relationship differed for day- and night- shift nurses. Sixty-one nurses (M=35.39, SD=11.73; 39 d...

Back pain and mental health are related. The relationship may differ by socioeconomic status (SES); yet, research has not examined the moderating role of perceived SES. We examined if the association between back pain and poor mental health is more pronounced for older men with lower perceived SES. We used a sample of community-dwelling older men (...

Introduction Previous research shows that insufficient and poor sleep is associated with perceiving more stressors the following day. Sleep may also be associated with daily mindfulness, a state in which one is highly aware and focused on the present moment without evaluating or judging that moment. The association between high mindfulness and bett...

Introduction Sleep and pain have a bidirectional relationship in clinical populations; however, we know less about the daily association in non-clinical but potentially vulnerable populations. Nurses are prone to poor sleep and pain symptoms due to work schedules and occupational stress. Implications from mindfulness-based interventions suggest tha...

Introduction Music may benefit sleep and daytime alertness by decreasing stress, increasing attention, and potentially, slowing the progression of dementia. This study examined preliminary effects of a group-based music intervention on sleep health among older adults with dementia. Methods Participants were older adults with dementia living in an...