Women who sleep in lighter bedrooms are more likely to be overweight, according to new research conducted in Britain.
Scientists have learned more and more over the past few years about the relationship between lack of sleep and weight gain. It’s believed that when you don’t get enough sleep, the hormones that control appetite are impacted. This new research looked at the issue from a different direction, however.
The Cancer Research in London asked 113,000 women to rate the amount of light in their bedrooms, ranging from light enough to read, to too dark to see your hand. Their responses were then compared to their body mass index, waist-to-hip ratio and other measures of obesity. The team found that all of those measurements were higher in women who slept in lighter rooms.
The researchers cautioned there was not enough evidence to advise people to sleep without any light in their room. More research is needed to determine the extent of the link between light and weight gain, and whether the weight gain is due to the excess light or due to poor sleep.
The study is published in the American Journal of Epidemiology.
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