The reports of specific waking-state oral behaviours, including awake bruxism activities, and psychological distress have a dose-response relationship: A retrospective medical record study.

Objective: To investigate if there are dose-response relationships between self-reported waking-state oral behaviours, including awake bruxism, and three indicators of psychological distress (depression, anxiety, stress).

Methods: The study sample consisted of 1,886 patients with function-dependent TMD pain. Relationships between six non-functional and six functional waking-state oral behaviours, scored on a 5-point ordinal scale, and the psychological factors were investigated using ordinal logistic regression.

Results: Mean age was 42.4 (±15.3) years, 78.7% being female. The odds of reporting the higher categories of non-functional oral behaviours depended on the severity of depression, anxiety, and stress. Most OR coefficients followed a quadratic dose-response distribution, the others increased linearly as the severity of the psychological scales increased. Almost no such associations were found with normal jaw function behaviours.

Conclusion: Within the limitations of this study, it may be concluded that non-functional waking-state oral behaviours, including awake bruxism, and psychological distress have a dose-response relationship, with higher levels of distress being associated with higher reports of oral behaviours.