Sleep Connected to Weight Problems

Sleep is something that we all need, and enjoy! How much sleep one needs seems to differ from person to person and the debate about the subject is ongoing. In my hometown, I can remember sporadic discussions all throughout my school days about whether or not school times should be made later. There is certainly controversy over the subject, especially since making school times later would affect many other aspects of children and adults lives such as sports, time for homework, and the times parents are able to work. A current study shows that amount of sleep has important affects on weight. In our society, weight has become a big issue. If the idea of teenagers and children needing more sleep for any other previously studied and stated reasons were not enough to get people to notice, perhaps the fact that inadequate sleep makes children overweight will.

This study compared the amount of sleep and BMI (body mass index) in children ages three to seventeen. Children under age three were not used in the study due to the fact that their sleep patterns are quite different not only from other children within the same age category, but also from children over age three. The data was taken from “the first and second waves of the Child Development Supplement of the Panel Survey of Income Dynamics which was a longitudinal study of a representative sample of U.S. individuals and their families” (Snell, Adam, Duncan). The children in the study kept sleep diaries; recording when they woke up and when they went to sleep. If the children were very young, the adults kept the diaries for them. They did not record what food they ate since the study was just observing the correlation between amount of sleep and BMI. Although food is obviously a factor in one’s BMI it is not what this study was interested in.

There were no gender differences in the study which is useful because it makes the results more believable since gender is one less factor to deal with. In fact, the problem with previous studies was that they did not control for other factors that might affect a child’s weight such as previous health problems, previous weight, family schedules, etc. This study focuses solely on the relationship between sleep patterns and BMI. There are no other factors involved. The study does not say that BMI is a direct result of the sleep patterns one has. The study just states that there is a correlation between BMI and sleep patterns. This was a preliminary study and if they wanted to follow up on it to see if the relationship was actually causal, then they would ask questions regarding whether or not chemicals in the brain are involved; or if the reason people who sleep less have a higher BMI is because they simply have more time to eat. In later studies it would likely also address the issue of whether or not there is such a thing as too much sleep or how someone with chronic irregular sleeping patterns BMI would be affected.

This type of study has been done before but this particular study was focused on how exactly BMI and the number of hours of sleep a child gets are related. There is no formula for that can predict ones BMI based on the amount of sleep they get since the two factors are simply found to be correlated. There is no hard and fast rule that says if one gets the right amount of sleep one will have no risk of being obese. Keep in mind that the term child refers to any person between the ages of three and seventeen. Even one hour of sleep can have a positive affect on BMI. A child that repeatedly gets less than eight hours of sleep will end up with negative impacts on their BMI; they will most likely be overweight. Between ten and eleven hours is sufficient; adolescents can get away with a little less (nine hours). At first it was not clear whether the study found that children need a certain amount of sleep overall, or if the actual times that they went to bed and woke up mattered also. Eventually it states that although the actual amount of hours is important, the bedtimes and wake times are important too. Younger children need to have earlier bedtimes; in fact increasingly they found that younger children are getting less sleep than they require. Similarly, all children need to be waking up at a later time. This is nearly impossible due to the early start time of most schools. The article feels that parents should try to get their school districts to change the start times of schools. To sum it all up, early bedtimes, later wake times, and more sleep overall will result in less overweight children. It is important to point out that this study does not imply that BMI is a direct result of the sleeping patterns one has. There are certainly many other factors such as genetics, activity level, eating habits, etc. The study simply points out that there is a correlation between the two.


Posted by KMellman