I have to confess I am writing this blog entry after midnight, so I am guilty of not getting enough sleep. I found these two studies that show that not getting enough sleep not only slows your metabolism but it makes it harder for you to lose your excess fat.
Here are excerpts from the studies:
Lack of Sleep Slows Metabolism
A small study published by Dr. Christian Benedict in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that a lack of sleep slows metabolism. In the study, healthy men were examined after a good night’s sleep compared to a night of continuous wakefulness. The results showed a reduction in energy expenditure by 5 to 20% in participants as well as elevated levels of ghrelin, a hormone that promotes hunger, and blood sugar after sleep deprivation. With the study only examining one night of sleep deprivation, it raises the question of how metabolism is affected over time by a lack of sleep.
Sleep More and Lose More Fat
A study conducted by the University of Chicago and the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that, regardless of their diet and exercise regimen, dieters lost more fat when they got more sleep. The study placed obese and overweight participants in two groups, one with 5.5 hours of sleep and one which got 8.5 hours of sleep over a 14-day span. With the same exercise and diet during that time, those with more sleep lost more than 50% of their weight from fat, while the group with 5.5 hours of sleep saw only a 25% fat loss. Despite consistent evidence, small studies do have not offered definitive or causative indicators as to why this is, so it’s incumbent on Americans to make sleep a priority.
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