Not enough sleep could make you fat

Thursday 25th October 2012

Research suggests that a good night's sleep can help beat obesity as scientists have found being overtired can make you fat.

Various investigations conducted at Pennsylvania State University have found that lack of sleep creates a hormone imbalance, which increases our appetite and leads to putting on weight. Partial sleep deprivation has also been found to be a factor in body weight regulation.

The team constructed a series of comparative tables specifying individual study populations, study designs, energy intake, energy expenditure, and measurements of the hormones; ghrelin which is a hunger-stimulating peptide, leptin which regulates metabolism, insulin which regulates carbohydrate and fat metabolism in the body and glucose. This identified patterns, including reduced insulin sensitivity, increases in ghrelin, and decreases in leptin among partially sleep-deprived individuals. Changes in ghrelin and leptin influenced energy intake among the study populations.

This research suggests that a good night's sleep could have a major impact in the fight against obesity. Current treatments for obesity focus more on changing lifestyles and increasing exercise and healthy eating. However this research shows that changing an individuals sleeping pattern could be vital in helping someone lose weight.

Tags: metabolism sleep hormones obesity

Category: Sleep Research

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