You Can’t Get Your Lost Sleep At The Weekend
If you sleep little one night, don’t think you’ll get it back at the weekend. This bad habit is related to weight gain and alterations in melatonin.
Spaniards sleep an average of one hour less than other Europeans. Many try to make up for it by staying in bed on Saturday or Sunday morning, but this is not the solution. The damage produced by the lack of hours of sleep is not fixed with more hours of rest during the weekend. In fact, sleeping longer on Saturday or Sunday could make the disorder worse.
Scientists from the University of Colorado at Boulder (United States) designed a study with three groups of participants. Those in the first group slept eight hours a day for 12 days. Those in the second slept 8 hours the first three nights, and 5 hours the following 9. The third group was able to sleep at will after 4 days of limitation, and then went back to sleep 5 hours for two more days.
In addition, the first three days all the participants followed a controlled diet and the following days they were free to choose their menus. The researchers analyzed the total number of hours of sleep, changes in calorie and weight intake, insulin resistance, and levels of melatonin (the sleep hormone, which has antioxidant properties).
Sleep hours are not recovered
Study leader Professor Kenneth Wright explains that the total number of hours slept by the participants with freedom to “recover” (the third group) did not equal the number of hours of the participants in the first group. As a curiosity, the participants of the third group extended the rest until noon on Saturday and the men slept more than the women.
On the other hand, by monitoring the levels of the hormone melatonin, the team found that the participants’ internal body clocks were altered to a greater extent when lack of sleep was combined with weekend “recovery” than when the pattern of sleep was meager, but so-so.
Increase weight and decrease insulin sensitivity
Regarding calorie intake and body weight, participants who enjoyed a constant eight hours of sleep did not show significant changes in weight. In contrast, the other two groups, who slept less, gained an average of 1.5 kg, and developed a decrease in sensitivity to insulin, the hormone that regulates blood sugar levels.
The researchers suggested that the weight gain could be due, at least in part, to the participants’ habit of adding a post-dinner meal on days of sleep deprivation, which can disrupt metabolism in several ways.
The scientists, who have published their study in Current biology, conclude that sleep deprivation has clear negative effects on metabolism.
