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American researchers have discovered that sleeping more makes it possible to reduce one’s calorie intake per day and thus to lose weight. The work was published Feb. 7 in the journal Jama.
What if increasing your sleep duration could help fight obesity? Researchers from the University of Chicago in the United States wanted to explore this track knowing that lack of sleep was already known as a risk factor for overweight.
“The current obesity epidemic, experts say, is driven primarily by increased caloric intake, rather than a lack of exercise”says Esra Tasali, director of the university’s Chicago Sleep Center and lead author of the study, on the official site . “Over the years, we and others have shown that sleep restriction has an effect on appetite regulation, which leads to increased food intake and puts you at risk for weight gain. over time” she continued. “More recently, the question everyone was asking was, well, if this is what’s happening with sleep loss, can we prolong sleep and reverse some of these adverse effects?”
More sleep regulates appetite
The scientists, who published their study on February 7, 2022 in the journal Jama Internal Medicine, conducted a clinical trial on 80 adults from November 1, 2014 to October 30, 2020. They followed participants aged 21 to 40 with a body mass index between 25 and 29.9 and had a usual sleep duration of less than 6 .5 hours per night. Participants either completed an individual counseling session that aimed to extend their sleep duration at night by up to 8.5 hours, or continued with their usual sleep. All volunteers were asked to continue their routine activities without prescribed diet or physical activity.
Conclusion: compared to the control group, the duration of sleep was increased by about an hour and a half per night among those who had to prolong their sleep. “This reduced participants’ overall calorie intake by an average of 270 calories per day”, can we read in the report. “Which would translate to a weight loss of around 12 kg over three years if the effects of now persist over a long-term period.”
A method to include in a weight loss process?
“This trial found that prolonged sleep reduced energy intake” can we read in the study. Thereby, “Improving and maintaining healthy sleep duration over longer periods could be part of obesity prevention and weight loss programs (…). Now, we’ve shown that in real life, without making any other lifestyle changes, you can get more sleep and eat fewer calories. It could really help people who are trying to lose weight.”