Since there is a link between obesity and lack of sleep, is it due to hormonal/metabolism issues, a side effect, or the behavior of those who lack sleep?

Question

Is the link due to?

1. Lack of sleep messing up metabolism and hormones or body recovery?

2. Lack of sleep being an additional problem caused by something else (Stress, overwork, bad diet, etc.), thus lack of sleep becomes more of a sign, and less of a cause, of obesity creating problems?

3. The behavior of those that lack sleep? They’re stressed out, impulsive, prolly work shitty jobs with no free time and therefore gravitate to, or are only provided, fattening junk?

4. Any combination of the three?

I read an article saying night owls die earlier and it just goes on to say “We ALL know night owls drink beer and alchohol, which causes problems” like I’ve never drunk in my life, that wasn’t a genuine study. Is there a similar thing here?

In: Biology

Answer 1

There’s a lot of reasons, some that have been covered already. Another is that your hunger hormones are regulated by sleep. There’s some research that show leptin (the hormone that helps you control ghrelin, an hormone that makes you hungry) is affected by sleep. If you sleep, you’re less hungry because you are more likely to have appropriate levels of leptin and ghrelin. If you don’t, ghrelin makes you more hungry.