Dietary Intake of Korean Adults Is Not Significantly Affected by Sleep Duration

This study investigated the effect of sleep duration on food and nutrient intake among adult Koreans. The effects of sleep duration on dietary patterns was studied in 7,370 Korean adults, aged 20 and older, who participated in the 1998 Korean National Health and Nutrition Survey in which the 24 hour recall method was used to estimate dietary intake. Sleep duration data from individual subject were collected by interview as a part of a behavior survey. Analysis of variance and Duncan's multiple range test were used to test the differences in food and nutrition intake and sleep duration. Food intakes of the male subjects were not significantly different among three groups. However, there were significant differences observed in intakes of beverage and alcohol among female subjects among the three groups. There were no significant differences observed for nutrient intake by sleep duration for either gender. Unlike the observation from European and American studies, food and nutrient intake of Korean subjects, in general, were not greatly affected by duration of sleep. This result may suggest that dietary habits of Koreans, as affected by sleep, are quite different from those of Europeans & Americans.