London - Not getting enough sleep doesn’t just make you tired. It also makes you fat, according to scientists.
In a study, participants who slept for five hours each night gained two pounds in weight over a week because they snacked more.
They consumed more calories in the form of after-dinner snacks than in any other meal.
But when they shifted to adequate sleep patterns they reduced their consumption of fat and carbohydrate and shed the pounds.
Professor Ken Wright, of Colorado Boulder University, said: “I don’t think extra sleep by itself is going to lead to weight loss.
“Problems with weight gain and obesity are much more complex than that. But I think it could help.”
His researchers monitored 16 young, lean and healthy adults at the University of Colorado Hospital’s sleep suite, where lighting was regulated to come on and go off at certain times.
On average, the participants who slept for up to five hours a night burned five percent more energy than those who slept up to nine hours a night. But they consumed six percent more calories.
In the study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Professor Wright said: “Just getting less sleep by itself is not going to lead to weight gain. But when people get insufficient sleep it leads them to eat more than they need.”
He added: “When people are sleep-restricted our findings show they eat during their biological night-time when internal physiology is not designed to be taking in food.”
Previous research has suggested that lack of sleep increases weight gain by slowing down the rate at which calories are burned, as well as increasing hunger. - Daily Mail