Less Sleep, More Obesity

Not that you needed another reason to get the kids to bed early, but here you go: a new study from the University of Michigan finds that every additional hour per night a third-grader spends sleeping reduces the child's chances of being obese in sixth grade by 40 percent. Wow. 40's a big number.(see story)

The less sleep they got, the more likely the children were to be obese in sixth grade, no matter what the child's weight was in third grade, said lead researcher Dr. Julie Lumeng. The research was published in the November issue of Pediatrics.

Among children who slept 10 to 12 hours a day, about 12 percent were obese by sixth grade. Of those who slept less than nine hours a day, 22 percent were obese by sixth grade!