By IANS
New York : It’s not just overeating and excessive television viewing. A new study says that lack of sleep can also cause children to put on weight.
The study, by researchers at the University of Michigan, explored the link between sleep and obesity and found that children who slept less than nine hours a day were at higher risk of being overweight.
Findings of the study have been published in the November issue of the journal Pediatrics.
The study involved third and sixth graders and cut across gender, race, socio-economic status and quality of the home environment.
The study found that sixth-graders who slept less were more likely to be overweight, and third-graders who got fewer hours of shut-eye were more likely to become overweight by the time they hit sixth grade.
“Many children aren’t getting enough sleep, and that lack of sleep may not only be making them moody or preventing them from being alert and ready to learn at school, it may also be leading to a higher risk of being overweight,” said Julie C. Lumeng, who led the study.
According to the study, obesity is thus another offshoot of less sleep.
On the positive side, the study shows that for every additional hour of sleep in third grade resulted in a 40 percent decrease in the child’s risk of being overweight in sixth grade.
According to US National Sleep Foundation recommendations, pre-schoolers must sleep between 11 and 13 hours; elementary school students between 10 and 12 hours; pre-teens between 9 and 11 hours; and teens between 8.5 to 9 hours.