New research suggests that certain types of physical activity can result in better sleep.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania found that physical activities, such as walking, as well as aerobics/calisthenics, biking, gardening, golfing, running, weight-lifting, and Yoga/Pilates are associated with better sleep habits, compared to no activity.

"These results are consistent with the growing scientific literature on the role of sleep in human performance," Michael Grandner, who led the study, said in a statement. "Lab studies show that lack of sleep is associated with poor physical and mental performance, and this study shows us that this is consistent with real-world data as well. Since these results are correlational, more studies are needed to help us understand whether certain kinds of physical activity can actually improve or worsen sleep, and how sleep habits help or hurt a person's ability to engage in specific types of activity."

For the study, researchers collected and analyzed data on sleep and physical activities of more than 429,000 adults from the 2013 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. They measured whether each of 10 types of activities was associated with typical amount of sleep, relative to both no activity and to walking. Survey respondents were asked what type of physical activity they spent the most time doing in the past month, and also asked how much sleep they got in a typical 24-hour period.

They found that physical activities such as household and childcare were associated with increased cases of poor sleep habits. Walking, aerobics/calisthenics, biking, gardening, golf, running, weight-lifting and yoga/Pilates were each associated with fewer cases of insufficient sleep, and household/childcare activity was associated with higher cases of insufficient sleep. These results were adjusted for age, sex, education level, and body mass index.

The findings will be presented at Sleep 2015, the 29th annual meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies LLC.