Midnight Snack May Cause Added Pounds
September 4, 2009 by Peggy Rowland
Filed under Women's Health
I don’t want to believe this study. I really don’t.
For me, late night is largely empty of distractions. If I don’t turn on Skype or Facebook, I can pretend the whole world is asleep while I write. Even my cat will not bother me while I work at night.
I see few problems with this habit of working late at night as I believe I’m just naturally tuned to stay up. (And I still get eight hours.) To me, the only bad thing about staying up late is that I get hungry. Apparently, that’s bad.
A new study involving mice who ate when they should be sleeping showed the habit to cause considerable weight gain over their fellows who ate during normal waking hours for mice.
Researchers from Northwestern University believe that circadian rhythms may play a role in weight gain. Their study is the first to link meal timing and increased weight gain.
In the study, mice fed a high-fat diet during normal sleeping hours gained 48% more weight over their baseline, compared to mice eating the same food during naturally wakeful hours (20% weight gain over their baseline).
Perhaps snacking on grapes would be best at midnight!
(Image via MorgueFile)
