Lack Of Sleep Pushes Towards Sugar

Author: Leticia Celentano Time for reading: ~1 minutes Last Updated: August 08, 2022

In this article, learn more about Lack Of Sleep Pushes Towards Sugar. Less than 5 hours of sleep a night lead to increased appetite.

People who sleep 5 hours or less at night are prone to consuming more sugars and drinks containing sugar and caffeine. Scientists came to this conclusion in 2016, after conducting a large-scale study involving more than 18,000 people.

Arik Prater, a professor in the Department of Psychiatry at UCSF , says the mechanism is probably two-way: lack of sleep creates the need for extra energy, which pushes people to energy and other sugary drinks and caffeine, and sugar and caffeine in turn drive them to build longer. Getting out of this vicious circle is difficult, and for some people it can take months or even years.

The first step to getting out of it starts with improving sleep. Giving up sugary drinks is much harder if the body still does not get the rest it needs.

The study examined the habits of all 18,000 participants - how much they sleep during the week, on weekends, their physical activity, eating habits and consumption of beverages - caffeinated and decaffeinated, sweetened and unsweetened, energy and carbonated beverages, juices, water. It was found that those who slept 5 hours or less also consumed 21% more sugary drinks, sugars and caffeine than those who slept 7-8 hours.

There are fewer tendencies to gain weight among those who sleep, because in the absence of sleep the body needs more calories. Sleep is associated with the intake of calories through circadian rhythms, which synchronize the body's functions and affect the metabolism, including the way we feel hungry and full. Disruption of the biological clock affects the regulation of key hormones such as leptin and ghrelin : leptin signals when we are full and ghrelin signals when we are hungry.

Lack Of Sleep Pushes Towards Sugar

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