Cette revue de la littérature examine les outils de mesure du sommeil des enfants de 0 à 36 mois, en analysant leurs forces, limites et pertinence pour une évaluation multidimensionnelle, intégrant des aspects cliniques et culturels. Elle s’inscrit dans une perspective développementale écologique, intégrant à la fois des aspects cliniques, environnementaux et parentaux.

Une recherche bibliographique a été menée sur Web of Science, PubMed et EBSCOHOST (1990–2024) pour identifier les outils en anglais et en français. Après sélection, 17 articles ont été retenus. Les outils ont été comparés selon leurs propriétés psychométriques (fidélité, validité, corrélations) et les dimensions du sommeil (durée, latence, qualité, habitudes/hygiène, troubles du sommeil et cognitions parentales.).

L’analyse des 17 questionnaires met en évidence une forte hétérogénéité des dimensions du sommeil évaluées. Les dimensions les plus fréquemment mesurées concernent la durée du sommeil, la latence d’endormissement et la qualité du sommeil. Les habitudes et l’hygiène de sommeil ainsi que les troubles du sommeil sont évalués de manière variable selon les outils, tandis que les cognitions parentales sont rarement prises en compte. L’organisation des dimensions selon un cadre écologique souligne une prédominance des évaluations centrées sur le sommeil de l’enfant au détriment des dimensions parentales.

Aucun outil ne permet une évaluation globale de l’ensemble des dimensions du sommeil chez le jeune enfant, en particulier la dimension ldes habitude/hygiène de sommeil ainsi que les conditions parentales. Actuellement il est nécessaire de combiner plusieurs questionnaires pour adopter une approche écologique. Ces résultats soulignent l’importance de prendre en compte les pratiques et cognitions parentales dans l’évaluation du sommeil des jeunes enfants, les parents constituant des acteurs centraux de la régulation du sommeil de l’enfant, dans un contexte de pratiques éducatives en constante évolution

Sleep is a fundamental process supporting infants’ physical, cognitive, and emotional development, particularly during the first three years of life [1]. Sleep difficulties are among the most frequent concerns reported in pediatric practice, affecting approximately 25 to 40% of young children [2–4]. During infancy and toddlerhood, sleep problems are predominantly behavioral in nature and include difficulties initiating and maintaining sleep, poor sleep quality, and maladaptive sleep habits [8,9]. These difficulties have been associated with later emotional, behavioral, and attentional problems [5–7]. Infant sleep difficulties also have a substantial impact on family functioning. Poor infant sleep is associated with parental sleep deprivation, increased stress, and emotional exhaustion, which may affect parental responsiveness and caregiving quality [10–12]. In early childhood, sleep regulation emerges from interactions between biological maturation, environmental conditions, and parental practices. Although objective measures such as polysomnography and actigraphy provide valuable information, their limited feasibility restricts their use in routine clinical settings and large-scale research [13–15]. Consequently, parental questionnaires remain the most commonly used tools to assess infant sleep, allowing the evaluation of sleep behaviors in naturalistic contexts and parental practices central to early development [8,9,16]. However, sleep questionnaires for young children vary widely in their conceptual scope, psychometric robustness, and assessed dimensions. Recent analyses of adult sleep questionnaires have highlighted the fragmentation of available tools and the lack of structured conceptual frameworks to organize sleep-related dimensions [28–30]. Comparable work in early childhood remains limited. The ecological model of human development [31], provides a relevant framework for conceptualizing infant sleep as a multi-level phenomenon influenced by child characteristics and parent–child interactions [32]. The present study aims to systematically review validated sleep questionnaires for children aged 0 to 36 months, examine their psychometric properties and assessed dimensions, and propose an ecological organization of sleep-related dimensions to facilitate comparative analysis.

A systematic literature search was conducted in accordance with PRISMA guidelines [33] using Web of Science, PubMed, and EBSCOHOST databases. Searches covered publications from January 1990 to November 25, 2024, using keywords related to sleep, infancy, questionnaires, and validation. Studies were included if they reported the development or validation of a sleep questionnaire applicable to children aged 0–36 months. Questionnaires validated on broader age ranges were included when they contained items relevant to infants and toddlers or were commonly used in studies involving this age group. Only studies published in English or French were retained. Seventeen studies met inclusion criteria. Questionnaires were compared in terms of structure, psychometric properties, and sleep dimensions assessed.

Six core dimensions of infant sleep assessment were identified across the questionnaires: sleep duration, sleep onset latency, sleep quality, sleep habits and hygiene, sleep disorders, and parental cognitions. Sleep duration, sleep quality, and sleep onset latency were the most frequently assessed dimensions. Sleep disorders (including insomnia symptoms, parasomnias, sleep-disordered breathing, hyperhidrosis, and excessive daytime sleepiness) were evaluated in a subset of tools. Sleep habits and hygiene (bedtime routines, sleep environment, autonomy at sleep onset, and pre-bedtime practices) were inconsistently assessed. Parental cognitions related to infant sleep (such as limit-setting beliefs, parental doubt, emotional distress, feeding as a sleep strategy, and safety-related concerns) were the least systematically explored. No single questionnaire covered all identified dimensions. Most instruments focused on one or two domains, resulting in partial assessments. Psychometric quality varied across tools, with some questionnaires demonstrating satisfactory reliability and validity, while others relied on limited or heterogeneous validation data.

This review highlights the marked heterogeneity of sleep questionnaires for children aged 0–36 months and the absence of a comprehensive assessment tool. Consistent with findings from adult sleep questionnaire content analyses [28–30], existing instruments capture fragmented aspects of sleep, limiting direct comparison and clinical interpretation. Organizing sleep-related dimensions within an ecological framework inspired by Bronfenbrenner provides a coherent perspective. Child sleep characteristics and sleep disorders align with the ontosystem, while sleep habits, hygiene practices, and parental cognitions primarily belong to the microsystem, where proximal parent–child interactions play a central role in sleep regulation (21). Higher ecological levels (mesosystem, exosystem, macrosystem), as well as developmental changes over time (chronosystem), remain largely unassessed by current questionnaires.

This systematic review of 17 validated sleep questionnaires for children aged 0 to 36 months demonstrates that current instruments assess complementary but fragmented dimensions of infant sleep. None provides a comprehensive, ecologically grounded evaluation suitable for both clinical and research purposes. The development of a multidimensional questionnaire integrating sleep parameters, sleep habits and hygiene, sleep disorders, and parental cognitions (validated specifically for infants and toddlers) represents a key methodological and clinical priority.