Chronotypical influence on eating behaviour and appetite control

A person’s chronotype reflects individual variability in diurnal rhythms for preferred timing of sleep and daily activities such as exercise and food intake. The aim of this review is to provide an overview of the evidence around the influence of chronotype on eating behaviour and appetite control, as well as our perspectives and suggestions for future research. Increasing evidence demonstrates that late chronotype is associated with adverse health outcomes. A late chronotype may exacerbate the influence of greater evening energy intake on overweight/obesity risk and curtail weight management efforts. Furthermore, late chronotypes tend to have worse diet quality, with greater intake of fast foods, caffeine and alcohol and lower intake of fruits and vegetables. Late chronotype is also associated with eating behaviour traits that increase the susceptibility to overconsumption such as disinhibition, food cravings and binge eating. Whether an individual’s chronotype influences appetite in response to food intake and exercise is an area of recent interest that has largely been overlooked. Preliminary evidence suggests additive rather than interactive effects of chronotype and meal timing on appetite and food reward, but that hunger may decrease to a greater extent in response to morning exercise in early chronotypes and in response to evening exercise in late chronotypes. More studies examining the interplay between an individual’s chronotype, food intake/exercise timing and sleep are required as this could be of importance to inform personalised dietary and exercise prescriptions to promote better appetite control and weight management outcomes.