AP
May 8, 2008
ATLANTA - People who sleep fewer than six hours a night - or more than nine - are more likely to be obese, according to a new government study.
The report also linked light sleepers to higher smoking rates, less physical activity and more alcohol use.
The study is based on door-to-door surveys of 87,000 US adults from 2004 through 2006 conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics, part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Such surveys can't prove cause-effect relationships, so it's not clear if smoking causes sleeplessness or if sleeplessness prompts smoking, said Charlotte Schoenborn, the study's lead author.
It also did not account for the influence of other factors, such as depression, which can contribute to heavy eating, smoking, sleeplessness and other problems.
