NEW 4 // SECOND QUARTER // Caterina Krauchuk

Sleeping in on the weekend can’t make up for lost sleep

Many people (majority young adults) nowadays sleep very low in the workweek, and sleep so much in the weekend to make up for lost sleep. But nevertheless, this method isn't healthy.

Christopher Depner, a sleep physiologist at the University of Colorado Boulder, and his colleagues put three groups of young adults in their mid-20s through different sleep regimens for roughly two weeks. One group slept about eight hours every night; another got roughly five hours a night; the third got around five hours on weeknights and slept whenever and as much as they wanted over a weekend. 

During the workweeks, both groups consumed roughly 400 to 650 Calories in late-night snacks, such as pretzels, yogurt and potato chips. By the end of the experiment, people in both groups had gained on average around 1.5 kilograms. 

But when it came to insulin sensitivity, the two groups diverged. Sensitivity across all body tissues in the weekend recovery group dropped around 27 percent, compared with their baseline sensitivity measured at the start of the experiment. 

Link of reference: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/sleep-recovery-weekend-health

Date: March 1, 2019. 

Scientific scope: Health.

Glossary: Diverged (divergió): increase indefinitely as more of its terms are added.

Commentary: In my experience I can say that this new is completely true. I used to sleep very little from Monday to Friday and I sleept a lot the weekends, like I stayed up until 3 a.m. and woke up approximately 2 p.m. That made me gain a lot of weight because I always woke up hungry and I started to eat lots of food. But also I feelt more tired and I didn't study or do homework because I only stayed on bed. So I think the best option for the society is to make a schedule for your work and sleep well.