KOREASCHOLAR

The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of sleep duration on dietary habits and body composition of university students. Sleep duration has recently been added to the list of risk factors for obesity. However, studies on this topic are fairly limited particularly in Korea. We studied the relationship between the duration of sleep and obesity principally based on body mass index and %body fat in university students. For this purpose, a survey was conducted on a total of 312 university students. The subjects enrolled for this study were divided into two groups: (1) those with sleep duration of 〈7 hours (148 students) and (2) those with sleep duration of 〉7 hours (164 students). Based on a self-reporting method, the participants filled up the questionnaires for more than 20 minutes. Based on the overall data obtained, we observed that most students (52.88%) skipped breakfast. This was mainly due to shortage of time (60.58%). We also observed that self-reporting dietary preferences included eating irregular meals (49.04%), overeating (19.55%), imbalanced diet (16.35%), and skipping meals (9.94%). It was found that cookies were the favorite snacks in the majority of the participants (50%). Our data reveal that the body mass index, fat mass, visceral fat, and subcutaneous fat, respectively of the shorter sleep duration group (〈7 h/day) were 23.78 kg/m2, 19.13 kg, 2.23 kg, and 11.15 kg. In contrast, in those of the control group (7 h/day), these values were found to be 21.84 kg/m2, 13.88 kg, 1.56 kg, and 12.11 kg. We also observed that there were significant correlations of sleep duration with body mass index (p〈0.05), fat mass (p〈0.01), visceral fat (p〈0.01), and beck depression score (p〈0.01). Our data suggest that the body mass index in the shorter sleep duration group was higher than that of the control group; however, %fat, visceral fat, and subcutaneous fat in the shorter sleep duration group were found to be higher than those of the control group. The data obtained through our study suggest that short sleep duration is clearly associated with a modest increase in general and abdominal obesity particularly in university students.

• 김경희 | Kim, KyungHee
• 조희숙 | Cho, HeeSook