Insights from the OppNet initiatives on psychosocial stress and sleep: themes for multidisciplinary team science research

Understanding the multilevel and bidirectional factors and basic mechanisms linking psychosocial stress, sleep, and their interactions to health outcomes is critical to building successful interventions and promoting population health. We report here on the first gathering of the National Institutes of Health Basic Behavioral and Social Sciences Research Opportunity Network grant recipients in the separate but interrelated topics of psychosocial stress and sleep. The meeting provided an opportunity for investigators to present their research methods and discuss emerging findings, gain insight into new research directions, and form innovative collaborations. Several recurring themes were identified: contextualizing behavioral processes as they unfold in the real world, developing and using novel measurement techniques, and looking over time and across the lifespan. The need for multidisciplinary team science was also identified as a key determinant of success. These themes suggest useful future research directions.