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Primary Insomnia Causes

Sleeplessness without any medical, psychological, or environmental cause can be divided into the following 3 subgroups: 

Psychophysiological insomnia

In a person with previously adequate sleep, sleeplessness begins because of a prolonged period of stress. Tension and anxiety resulting from the stress causes awakening. Thereafter, sleep in such persons becomes associated with frustration and arousal, resulting in poor sleep hygiene. In most people, as the initial stress decreases, normal sleep habits are gradually restored because the bad sleep habits are not reinforced. However, in some people, the bad habits are reinforced, the person "learns" to worry about his or her sleep, and sleeplessness continues for years after the stress has subsided. Therefore, it is also called learned insomnia or behavioral insomnia.

Idiopathic insomnia

Lifelong sleeplessness is attributed to an abnormality in the neurologic control of the sleep-wake cycle involving areas of the brain responsible for wakefulness and sleep. Possibly, the sleep system possesses a lesion (change due to disease) that predisposes the person towards arousal.

Sleep state misperception

The person complains of insomnia without objective evidence of any sleep disturbance.