Sleep, mood and sociability in a healthy population

Sleep and mood problems have a considerable public health impact with serious societal and significant financial effects. In this work, we study the relationship between these factors in the everyday life of healthy young adults. More importantly, we look at these factors from a social perspective, studying the impact that couples have on each other and the role that face-to-face interactions play. We find that there is a significant bi-directional relationship between mood and sleep. More interestingly, we find that the spouse's sleep and mood may have an effect on the subject's mood and sleep. Further, we find that subjects whose sleep is significantly correlated with mood tend to be more sociable. Finally, we observe that less sociable subjects show poor mood more often than their more sociable contemporaries. These novel insights, especially those involving sociability, measured from quantified face-to-face interaction data gathered through smartphones, open up several avenues to enhance public health research through the use of latest wireless sensing technologies.