The role of sleep in the relations between early-life trauma and the development of adverse psychological trajectories is relatively unknown and was the primary aim of the present study. Military veterans were evaluated for posttraumatic stress disorder, combat exposure, trauma history, sleep quality, disruptive nocturnal behaviors, and a subsample completed overnight polysomnography that yielded objectively measured sleep parameters. When relevant variables were controlled, increased earlier-life traumatic event exposure was associated with increased rapid-eye-movement sleep (REMs) fragmentation, and increased REMs fragmentation was associated with increased later-life disruptive nocturnal behaviors. REMs fragmentation carried an indirect relation between earlier-life trauma and later-life disruptive nocturnal behaviors. Objectively measured sleep parameters were used to describe REMs fragmentation physiology. The current findings elucidate the important role that earlier-life trauma exposure may have in the development of REM sleep physiology, and how this altered sleep physiology may have dynamic influences on subsequent posttraumatic stress symptoms in adulthood.
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