News You Can Use: Sleep and Lean Kids

News You Can Use: #Sleep and Lean #Kids 

Early to Bed and Early to Rise — study suggests it’s keeping kids leaner

According to research reported in the journal SLEEP, children who went to bed late and got up late were 1.5 times more likely to become obese than those who went to bed early and got up early. Furthermore, late-nighters were almost twice as likely to be physically inactive and 2.9 times more likely to sit in front of the TV and computer or play video games for more hours than guidelines recommend. Here are some additional findings from the researchers at the University of South Australia:

• Early-bed/early-risers went to bed 70 to 90 minutes earlier, woke up 60 to 80 minutes earlier and accumulated 27 minutes more moderate to vigorous physical activity each day than late-risers.
• Late-bed/late-risers watched TV, played video games or were online 48 minutes longer each day than early-bed/early-risers, primarily between 7 p.m. and midnight.
• On a broad scale, late-bed/late-risers replaced about 30 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity with 30 minutes of sedentary behavior each day, relative to the early-bed/early-risers group.
• Body-mass index (BMI) scores were higher in late-risers than early-risers, and late-risers were more likely to be overweight or obese.
• Late-bed/late-risers tended to have fewer siblings, live in major cities, come from lower income households and have a part-time job.