Hormonal
Sleep loss increases the risk of obesity by dysregulating appetite hormones (decreasing leptin, increasing ghrelin) and increasing orexin-driven hunger, leading to higher caloric intake.
If you are sleeping less than 7 hours, your body is biologically wired to want more food. This is driven by lower leptin (satiety hormone) and higher ghrelin (hunger hormone). Recognize this as a biological signal, not a personal failure, and plan your nutrition accordingly.
Sleep curtailment is also associated with a dysregulation of the neuroendocrine control of appetite, with a reduction of the satiety factor, leptin, and an increase in the hunger-promoting hormone, ghrelin. Thus, sleep loss may alter the ability of leptin and ghrelin to accurately signal caloric need, acting in concert to produce an internal misperception of insufficient energy availability.
Why this rating
Supported by multiple laboratory studies showing hormonal changes and epidemiologic studies linking short sleep to higher BMI.
Source
<i>Associations between Sleep Loss and Increased Risk of Obesity and Diabetes</i>
Kristen L. Knutson et al. · Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · 2008
DOI 10.1196/annals.1417.033
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