Got the late night munchies? Or maybe you find yourself at Waffle House every Saturday morning at 2am? Even if you eat within your calorie allotment every day and exercise on top of that, late night eating could be impairing your weight loss progress.
Scientists at Northwestern University were curious about the night-shift weight gain phenomena. People who work the night shift are more likely than day workers to be obese. They suspected this has something to do with circadian rhythm so they gathered some mice and conducted a study. I suspect they might be right plus humans sneak food at night or seemingly forget what they ate after a few beers.
The scientists fed one group of mice a high fat diet for a 12-hour period at night time and the second group of mice the exact same diet during a 12-hour period of the day. The mice eating while the rest of us were sleeping saw a 48% increase in weight whereas the day eating mice experienced a 20% increase in weight. Both groups of mice were allowed to eat ad lib but interestingly enough, food intake didn’t differ between the groups (i.e. both the night eating mice and day eating mice at the same amount of total calories).
What does our internal clock have to do with things? It regulates (or it should) when we sleep based on how light it is outside. And, it may also play a role in meal timing – i.e. our body is programmed for us to eat when we should be awake and not when it’s pitch black out at 3 a.m.
After this study, the Northwestern crew plans to look at the biological basis for their results so, stay tuned.
If you tend to get hungry late at night or you are up late partying, alter what you eat when. Eat enough food during the day and don’t go hours without eating and you’ll find that you don’t need bacon, eggs and waffles at 2 a.m. The bottom line here is that weight loss or altering your physique involves more than just counting calories. What you eat, when you eat, how much you eat and what you do for physical activity all play a role. If weight loss was a simple one-step process, Quick Weight Loss Centers would be putting themselves out of business. Instead, weight loss and the shape of your body is a multifaceted process with several diet, environmental and personal factors that should be considered.