Research suggests that eating food at night can increase the risk of obesity and accumulating body fat, and can make it harder to lose weight.
Researchers at Brigham and Women's Hospital conducted a new study to determine the reason why. (1)
A group of 16 people who are either overweight or have obesity participated in two different meal schedules. One schedule involved eating meals early and the other involved eating the same meals four hours later in the day.
Here’s what happened:
The levels of leptin decreased when people ate late. Since leptin is responsible for making one feel full, individuals who ate late felt more hungry.
The rate of calorie burning was slower when eating late compared to eating early.
During late eating, the expression of genes in fat tissue shifted to promote the storage of fat.
The conclusion?
Contrary to popular belief, the timing of your meals can affect you, and having a late-night meal may be particularly problematic.
If you pay attention to the time of day when you eat, please leave a comment!
References:
Nina Vujović, Matthew J. Piron, Jingyi Qian, Sarah L. Chellappa, Arlet Nedeltcheva, David Barr, Su Wei Heng, Kayla Kerlin, Suhina Srivastav, Wei Wang, Brent Shoji, Marta Garaulet, Matthew J. Brady, Frank A.J.L. Scheer, Late isocaloric eating increases hunger, decreases energy expenditure, and modifies metabolic pathways in adults with overweight and obesity,Cell Metabolism,Volume 34, Issue 10, 2022, Pages 1486-1498.e7, ISSN 1550-4131, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cmet.2022.09.007.
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