People who prefer to go to bed and wake up later – a sleep chronotype known as the night owl – may die early due to the bad habits they develop when they stay up late, according to a new study.
“The increased risk of mortality associated with being a clearly ‘nocturnal’ person seems to be explained mainly by a higher consumption of tobacco and alcohol. This is compared with those who are clearly ‘morning’ people,” said the study’s first author, Christer Hublin, a researcher at the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health in Helsinki, in a statement.
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The study, published Friday in the journal Chronobiology International, was a follow-up to the 2002 Finnish Twin Cohort study. The new study followed nearly 24,000 twins from 1981 to 2018 in an effort to uncover the causes of health-related behaviors and illnesses.
When the study originally began, each twin was asked to choose one answer from the following questions: I am clearly a morning person; I am to some extent a morning person; I’m clearly a night person; or I am, to some extent, a night person.
Only about 10% of the twins described themselves as night people, while 33% said they preferred to stay up late. More than 29% were clearly morning people, while another 27.7% described themselves as somewhat inclined to prefer mornings.
For the new study, researchers analyzed the death records of a subset (8,728 participants) of the original study. After adjusting the data to take into account educational level, alcohol use, smoking, body mass level and sleep duration, the study found that being a nocturnal person increased the risk of premature death by about 9% in compared to mornings. who are often referred to as early risers.
“We’ve known for a long time that those who have a preference for the nocturnal type are more likely to drink more, have an alcohol use disorder, and are also more likely to use other substances, including tobacco,” said Dr. Bhanu Prakash Kolla, a sleep medicine specialist at the Mayo Clinic’s Center for Sleep Medicine in Rochester, Minn., who was not involved in the study.
However, a 9% increase in the risk of premature death is significant, he added, leaving room for other ways the nocturnal type increases mortality risk.
“Other possible causes that come to mind include those who are the nocturnal type will likely need to wake up early for work/school, therefore end up sleeping less and sleep deprivation may increase risk,” Kolla said in an email.
Your sleep schedule
Everyone has a 24-hour internal clock, or circadian rhythm, that regulates the release of the hormone melatonin to promote sleep.
Your personal sleep chronotype, which is believed to be inherited, may determine when this process occurs. If you’re an innate early riser, your circadian rhythm releases melatonin much earlier than normal, energizing you to become more active in the morning.
Early risers tend to perform better in school and are more active throughout the day, which may partly explain why studies have found they have a lower risk of cardiovascular disease, experts say.
In night owls, however, the body’s internal clock secretes melatonin much later, making the early morning sluggish and pushing the peak of activity and alertness later and into the evening.
The jury is still out
Night owls may be at greater risk of chronic disease, previous research has shown. A 2022 study found that night owls were more sedentary, had lower levels of aerobic fitness, and burned less fat at rest and while active than early risers.
Night owls were also more likely to be insulin resistant, meaning their muscles required more insulin to get the energy they needed, the study showed.
Studies have revealed that night owls may be more at risk and are more likely to skip breakfast and eat more later in the day. Night owls also have higher levels of visceral body fat in the abdominal region, a key risk factor for type 2 diabetes and heart disease.
Phyllis Zee, director of the Center for Circadian and Sleep Medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, who reviewed the 2022 study, said at the time that “there is good evidence that sleeping late is linked to an increased risk of metabolic diseases and cardiovascular.
“Several mechanisms have been proposed: sleep loss, circadian misalignment, late-day eating, and exposure to less morning light and more evening light, which have all been shown to affect insulin sensitivity,” said Zee, who is also a professor of neurology at northwestern.
Can you change your chronotype?
If being a night owl worries you, there are things you can do to make it go overnight – at least a little bit, Zee previously said: “It’s like you have a gene for diabetes, right? You can modify it with your lifestyle, but it doesn’t change.”
First, start with light – lots of light, once the alarm goes off. Use natural sunlight if possible, or turn on artificial lights, especially those in the blue spectrum, which tell the body to wake up.
“The strongest reset for the circadian system is bright light,” Zee said. “Morning light changes the oscillation of your circadian clock genes at both a cellular and molecular level. You’re also training all of your rhythms, whether it’s sleep, blood pressure, heart rate or your cortisol rhythm to be earlier.”
You also want to switch things up at night, Zee said, removing bright sources of light much earlier to help your body start producing melatonin. That means no television, laptop, or smart screens unless you use a filter that turns blue light into the amber or reddish-orange range, which doesn’t suppress melatonin.
Another tip: Eat much earlier in the evening than you’d prefer, Zee said: “My rule: stop eating no later than three hours before bed.” Move your exercise routine to the morning or early afternoon and avoid heavy exercise in the evening as well.
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