Columbia Study Finds 80-Minute Sleep Cut Adds 1 Pound in 6 Weeks
Updated
Updated · SciTechDaily · Jul 25
Columbia Study Finds 80-Minute Sleep Cut Adds 1 Pound in 6 Weeks
3 articles · Updated · SciTechDaily · Jul 25
Summary
Ninety-five adults who cut nightly sleep by about 80 minutes for six weeks gained an average of 1 pound in a Columbia University study designed to mirror common chronic sleep loss.
Seventeen extra sedentary minutes a day accompanied the shorter-sleep phase, and inactivity rose by nearly 30 minutes among men and postmenopausal women even after accounting for longer waking time.
The trial compared a six-week period of delaying bedtime by 90 minutes with a separate six-week period of normal 7-to-8-hour sleep, using wrist monitors plus weight, waist, body-composition and fasting-hormone measures.
Earlier related findings in a subset of the same participants linked similar sleep cuts to greater insulin resistance in at-risk women and inflammatory-cell influx in the hearts of people already vulnerable to heart disease.
Researchers said the six-week gain looks modest but could become clinically meaningful over a year, reinforcing sleep as a factor in obesity, diabetes and heart-disease risk.