Effect of Lack of Sleep on Weight Gain among College Students - Research Paper Example

Effect of Lack of Sleep on Weight Gain among College April 22, Short sleep (i.e. sleep at night that is < 5 hours for adolescents and adults and < 9 hours of sleep for children, ages 5 to 12) has been connected with increased body weight and body mass index (BMI) (Martinez et al., 2014; Westerlund et al., 2014). The researcher will conduct an experiment that will determine if sleeping for < 5 will result to weight gain among college students. 20 students will be assigned to sleep for 6 to 8 hours, while 20 will be asked to sleep for 5 hours or less. The study will strive to control nutrition and physical fitness differences through recommendations and use of MyFitnessPal mobile application that will help self-monitor their diet and physical activity levels. Findings will show that short sleepers will have >5 kg weight gain compared to sufficient sleepers. Short sleepers will have weight gain even after controlling for gender, age, and race. However, media use and nutrition may impact the relationship between short sleep and weight gain. Future studies should use more accurate ways of measuring sleep duration and try to explain the physiological, psychological, and social dynamics behind sleep duration’s impact on weight gain. Short sleep, which is defined as sleep at night that is < 5 hours for adolescents and adults and < 9 hours of sleep for children (ages 5 to 12), has been correlated with obesity because sleep deprivation may increase body weight and body mass index (BMI) (Martinez et al., 2014; Westerlund et al., 2014). Higher weight and BMI, in turn, may contribute to the development or worsening of obesity for adults (Gutiérrez-Repiso et al., 2014) and children (Martinez et al., 2014), although findings are mixed for adults, due to other factors that could impact their weight gain, such as eating disorders, eating habits, media use, and sleep quality (Magee & Hale, 2012). Sleep quality refers to the absence or minimal prevalence of sleep disturbances (Yeh & Brown, 2014). Sleep quality may also impact sleep duration because repetitive sleep interruptions can wake people up earlier than they want to, or decrease their motivation to sleep for more than 5 hours (Gonnissen et al., 2013). The underlying mechanisms that connect sleep duration and weight gain remain unclear because of the complexity of the relationships among them and the existence of confounding, moderating, and mediating variables (Magee & Hale, 2012). Magee and Hale (2012) reviewed studies that examined the causal pathway between short sleep and weight gain, and they noted that sleeping for five hours or less can increase hunger due to higher leptin levels and lower ghrelin levels. Short sleep also presents more opportunities to eat, changes in thermoregulation, and greater fatigue that may also make the body store, than burn, fat (Magee & Hale, 2012).The two main causes of obesity that sleep deprivation may stimulate or facilitate are higher caloric intake and lower energy expenditure (Magee & Hale, 2012). Gonnissen et al. (2013) confirmed in their review of literature that short sleep can produce neuro-endocrine changes which may increase appetite and hunger. Yeh and Brown (2014) noted that disordered eating (e.g. eating unhealthy midnight snack) which comes with short sleep patterns can result to poor sleep quality and low sleep duration, and that altogether, the latter may increase BMI. Sleep duration’s effect on weight gain, nevertheless, is complex because sleep quality, nutrition, and sedentary lifestyle, as well as obesity itself, impacts their relationship (Nagai et al., 2013). The impact of sleep duration on weight gain may be mediated by cultural factors that impact eating habits and lifestyle (Nagai et al., 2013). Nagai et al. (2013) did not find a correlation between sleeping for 5 hours or less, weight gain and higher BMI for 13,629 Japanese participants, with ages spanning 40 to 79 years. They collected data about sleep duration, weight gain, and BMI from 1995 to 2006. Findings showed that longer sleep > 9 hours is correlated with weight gain and obesity more than short sleep of < 5 hours. Japanese culture that is rich with vegetable and fresh food intake and that promotes biking and walking may be decreasing the effect of short sleep on weight gain. In addition, some studies also pointed out the importance of sleep quality to attaining the appropriate weight and BMI for one’s age, gender, and lifestyle. Westerlund et al. (2014) learned from their survey involving 40,197 participants (14,407 were men, while 25,790 were women) that poor quality sleep was also related to higher BMI for men and women alike. They learned that not all short sleepers had weight gain and higher BMI compared to medium-length sleepers, or those who slept for 6 to 8 hours every night. Like Nagai et al. (2013), Westerlund et al. (2014) even observed that long sleep which lasted for > 9 hours resulted to higher BMI, especially for women. These studies, nevertheless, reviewed articles which indicated, that short sleep may increase body weight, which increases BMI too (Nagai et al., 2013; Westerlund et al., 2014). The study will involve increasing sleep deprivation for college students to understand the connection between short sleep and weight gain. It hypothesizes that sleeping for < 5 hours will produce weight gain. In order to reduce the confounding effects of nutrition, the researcher will offer menus for two weeks to the participants that can meet basic nutritional needs, especially calories, and a recommendation for similar physical activity levels of engaging in at least 30 minutes of walking every day. If they will have any additional physical activity or changes in food consumed, they will have to log it in their fitness mobile application that the researcher will check after two weeks. Furthermore, media time will be adjusted by collecting information about media use and cultural and gender factors will also be adjusted. Methodology Research Design The research will be a pretest-posttest experimental quantitative study that will last for two weeks with an independent variable of short sleep. Short sleep refers to < 5 hours of sleep at night. The experimental group participants will be called short sleepers. The study will use a control group who will sleep for 6 to 8 hours, which is considered as sufficient sleep. Those who will be part of this group will be called sufficient sleepers. The dependent variable is weight gain that may happen for one or both these two groups: short sleepers and sufficient sleepers. Data will be presented as the mean and standard deviation. T-test will be used to analyze the data and to determine differences between means. In addition, oneway or multivariate analysis of variance will also be used to determine inter-group differences. Spearman’s test, moreover, will be applied to determine the correlation between variables (Gutiérrez-Repiso et al., 2014). Furthermore, to determine the strength of relationship between dependent variables and the explanatory variables, the study will use logistic regression analysis and calculating the odds ratio (OR), as well as the 95% confidence interval (CI) (Gutiérrez-Repiso et al., 2014). For these cases, the study will use a rejection level of α = 0.05. Analyses will be done through SPSS v10 from SPSS Inc. (made in Chicago, IL, USA) (Gutiérrez-Repiso et al., 2014). Participants Forty college students will be recruited through online and bulletin board invitations. A post on the school website will ask for students who are willing to participate in a sleep duration study without informing them of the dependent variable to reduce the confounding effect of this knowledge to their self-reports on sleep duration. 20 students will be assigned to the experimental set-up and 20 for the control set-up. They will be paid $30 each after completing the entire study, although they are free to drop out any time. Before being selected for the study, they will be asked about sleeping and eating disorders, and those who have them will not be included to decrease the possibility of these variables being confounding or moderating variables. Procedures The first step of the study is informing the chosen 40 participants about the procedures of the study verbally, but with the help of a written script. The participants will also be provided a written explanation of the steps they will undergo, including collecting body weight and personal information. Moreover, they will be asked to install the MyFitnessPal mobile application that will help self-monitor their diet and physical activity levels. The researcher will check and take photos of data from their MyFitnessPal applications two weeks after the experiment. Pretest measurement includes measuring their weight through a mechanical physician balance beam scale early in the morning, from 6 am to 8 am, the moment that these students wake up. They will be asked to drop by at the school clinic, where the scale is located and where the researcher will record their pretest weight. Then, they will be randomly assigned to short and sufficient sleep groups. They will be asked to sleep for the hours determined for their group. In addition, they will be asked about their hours of sleep before, during, and after the study in a survey. They will also be requested to closely monitor their diet and physical levels, and that if they will make some changes in their eating and lifestyle habits, to log it into their MyFitnessPal. After two weeks of the study, their weight will again be measured using the same scale. Measurement Their body weight will be measured through a mechanical physician balance beam scale. They will also answer a survey where they will provide information on age, gender, race, ethnicity, highest level of education attained (7–9, 10–12, >12 years), level of daily physical exercise (low/moderate/high), media use (kinds of media used each day and approximated use every week), smoking practices (never/former/present-time smoking status), frequency of alcohol consumption (never, ≤3 times per month, 1–4 times per week, ≥5 times per week), and work schedule (daytime/shift including nights/other kinds of jobs/no work) (Westerlund et al., 2014). Results T-test and oneway or multivariate analysis of variance showed that short sleepers will have >5 kg weight gain compared to sufficient sleepers after two weeks. Short sleepers will have weight gain even after controlling for gender, age, and race, although media use and nutrition may impact the relationship between short sleep and weight gain. Those who frequently eat junk food and fatty food, for instance, will have higher weight gain among short sleepers than those who eat healthier food. Discussion Assuming the hypothesis is supported, the experimental study will show that sleeping for five hours or less can induce weight gain across gender, age, and cultures. Magee and Hale (2012) reviewed studies that explained that not getting enough sleep can lead to physiological changes, which may increase appetite and hunger, while also lowering calorie expenditure. Greater appetite and hunger can boost caloric intake. Yeh and Brown (2014) further noted that short sleep may also co-occur with unhealthy eating habits and sedentary lifestyle. Some college students sleep less because of high media use, whether it is for academic or non-academic purposes and sleeping late increases opportunities for eating more. These variables can significantly impact sleep duration’s effect on weight gain. The study is limited because of its small sampling and the limitations of the characteristics of these sampling. College students may have less or more stress compared to other subgroups, which can also impact weight gain. In addition, past physical activity may also have more impact on weight gain than short sleep itself. For instance, physically fit people may not show increase in weight even when sleeping for less than six hours. Furthermore, two weeks is a limited timeframe. It may not be enough to determine the relationship between short sleep and weight gain. Expanding the timeframe, however, is unethical since having a short sleep is detrimental to the health and academic conditions of participants (Gutiérrez-Repiso et al., 2014). Moreover, a survey approach to recording sleep has accuracy issues. Participants may be under- or over-reporting sleep duration. Future studies should have more accurate ways of measuring sleep duration. They should also consider the impact of sleep quality on weight gain and explain when and why sleep quality for short sleepers may or may not result to weight gain. In addition, future studies should also help explain the physiological, psychological, and social dynamics behind sleep duration’s effect on weight gain. References Gonnissen, H., Adam, T., Hursel, R., Rutters, F., Verhoef, S., & Westerterp-Plantenga, M. (2013). Sleep duration, sleep quality and body weight: Parallel developments. Physiology & Behavior, 121, 112-116. DOI: 10.1016/j.physbeh.2013.04.007. Gutiérrez-Repiso, C., Soriguer, F., Rubio-Martín, E., de Antonio, I., de Adana, I., Almaraz, M., … Rojo-Martínez, G. (2014). Night-time sleep duration and the incidence of obesity and type 2 diabetes. Findings from the prospective Pizarra study. Sleep Medicine, 15(11), 1398-1404. DOI: 10.1016/j.sleep.2014.06.014. Magee, L., & Hale, L. (2012). Longitudinal associations between sleep duration and subsequent weight gain: A systematic review. Sleep Medicine Reviews, 16(3), 231-241. DOI:10.1016/j.smrv.2011.05.005. Martinez, S., Tschann, J., Greenspan, L., Deardorff, J., Penilla, C., Flores, E., Pasch, L., Gregorich, S., & Butte, N. (2014). Is it time for bed? Short sleep duration increases risk of obesity in Mexican American children. Sleep Medicine, 15(12), 1484-1489. DOI: 10.1016/j.sleep.2014.09.009. Nagai, M., Tomata, Y., Watanabe, T., Kakizaki, M., & Tsuji, I. (2013). Association between sleep duration, weight gain, and obesity for long period. Sleep Medicine, 14(2), 206-210. DOI:10.1016/j.sleep.2012.09.024. Yeh, S., & Brown, R. (2014). Disordered eating partly mediates the relationship between poor sleep quality and high body mass index. Eating Behaviors, 15(2), 291-297. DOI: 0.1016/j.eatbeh.2014.03.014. Westerlund, A., Bottai, M., Adami, H., Bellocco, R., Nyrén, O., Åkerstedt, T., & Lagerros, Y. (2014). Habitual sleep patterns and the distribution of body mass index: cross-sectional findings among Swedish men and women. Sleep Medicine, 15(10), 1196-1203. DOI: 10.1016/j.sleep.2014.06.012. Read More