An extra 1.5 hours of sleep can have an enormous effect on the body composition of children.
In a new study, subjects were required to increase or decrease their sleep each night by 1.5 hours. After one week, subjects switched groups, and the differences were compared between subjects when they had the extra sleep.
Each day the subjects received less sleep, they had significantly lower levels of leptin, which is the hormone responsible for feeling full. As a result, the sleep deprived group consumed an extra 150 calories every day, which would be enough to cause 15 pounds of fat gain per year.
Conclusions
For those who are having trouble consuming an optimal amount of calories to reach your goals, getting an extra 90 minutes of sleep per night may be enough to affect your diet. The fact that children are required to wake up so early for school, and thus are usually sleep deprived, is a significant contributor to the child obesity epidemic.
References
1 Hart CN, et al. Changes in children’s sleep duration on food intake, weight, and leptin. Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. 2013 Nov.