--- title: 6 Things That Determine How Long You'll Live description: Researchers have developed a new lifestyle risk score that determines your risk for death, based on your bad habits. canonical: https://time.com/4140559/6-things-that-determine-how-long-youll-live/ author: Alexandra Sifferlin article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-12-09T21:39:51.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:56:53.736Z article:section: Health og:title: 6 Things That Determine How Long You'll Live og:description: Researchers have developed a new lifestyle risk score that determines your risk for death, based on your bad habits. og:url: https://time.com/4140559/6-things-that-determine-how-long-youll-live/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: 6 Things That Determine How Long You'll Live twitter:description: Researchers have developed a new lifestyle risk score that determines your risk for death, based on your bad habits. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # 6 Things That Determine How Long You'll Live > Sponsored content. 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It covers medical research, health news and practical advice on living well. #### Where can I get reliable health news by email? Health Matters is TIME's daily health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free daily newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. ## Video: Humans Evolved To Get Less, But Better Quality, Sleep [Watch (HLS stream): Humans Evolved To Get Less, But Better Quality, Sleep](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/obu1caIx.m3u8) (1:13)  _Published 2015-12-15. A Duke University study hypothesizes it was early human ancestors' change from sleeping in trees to on the ground that lets us sleep less today._ by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin Dec 9, 2015 9:39 PM UTC by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin Dec 9, 2015 9:39 PM UTC Researchers have developed a new lifestyle score that determines your risk for death, based on your bad habits. A bit morbid perhaps, but lifestyle behaviors are responsible for a wide-range of preventable diseases from cancer to heart disease. Now, Australian researchers argue growing evidence suggests some other previously unconsidered risk factors like sitting for a long periods of time should be included when estimating a person’s mortality risk. By pulling six risk factors together into one index, the researchers argue they provide clinically relevant information about a person’s health, and what combination of red flags are especially concerning. In the [new study](http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1001917) published in the journal _PLOS_ _Medicine_,researchers looked a group of 231,048 Australian adults age 45 and up who were followed for six years. --- > “” --- When added together, they found that the people who had higher scores in these combined measures had a higher risk of death. The researchers used the measurement “person-years lost,” which is the number of years lost due to a person in the study dying before the study ended. Based on their findings, the researchers calculated that if none of the men and women had any of the risk factors, a third of the person-years lost from death would have been avoided. Interestingly, short sleep duration had less of an effect on mortality risk than sleeping for a long time. Why that’s the case remains unknown, but the study authors write that it’s possible that long sleep duration indicates underlying disease, fatigue or depression. On its own, sitting for a long time had a small effect on all-cause mortality, but the researchers found that the combination of long bouts of sitting and a lack of exercise had a stronger effect. “This might indicate that prolonged sitting tends to be particularly harmful among those who are physically inactive,” the authors write. “To me, both \[sedentary behavior and sleep\] are very important,” says study author Ding Ding, a senior research fellow at The University of Sydney. “Both are closely linked to our overall lifestyle, are likely to interact with other lifestyle behaviors, and together they represent the majority of our daily life.” The good news is that by understanding how these different behaviors impact our ability to have a long life, we can make modifications for better health. ## Transcript If you're already on your third cup of coffee you might not believe this, but humans evolved to get less and better sleep than our ancestors. Duke University researchers analyzed a database of sleep patterns for hundreds of mammal species with an emphasis on 21 primate species. Using statistical techniques they were able to rank how far removed From humans each primate species was. They found humans get significantly less sleep than most other primates. Seven hours on average versus as many as 17 for gray mouse lemurs. But humans also get a greater proportion of REM sleep, the stage associated with dreaming, boosting creative thinking and the consolidation of memories. Is the lack of sleep due to artificial lights? Studies have already shown tv and computer screen stop the production of melatonin. Making it harder to fall asleep. Yet the Duke researchers reported a separate study found people in three different hunter / gatherer societies, without electricity sleep a little bit less than people with electricity. Instead, the researchers have hypothesized that the reason for our shorter deeper slumber Its early human ancestors shift from sleeping on trees to on the ground. While sleeping by fires and in large groups protected us from predators, humans also would have avoided dangers like falling from great heights. And this would have allowed them to survive the vulnerability that comes with deeper and more efficient stages of sleep. Eventually those suited for the different sleep pattern passed on more of their genes. 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