Weather Affects Your Mood

How weather effect your mood? Weather can have more than a little impact on your mood. Researchers in Germany branched out beyond just sunny and cloudy and looked at temperature, wind, sunlight, rain and snow, air pressure, and how long the days were. The study was led by Jaap Denissen of Humboldt University in Berlin. The study had 1,233 participants, all living in Germany at the time. Most of the participants were women, the average age was 28, with ages spanning from 13 to 68 years old.Study participants were first given a personality test that measured extraversion, neuroticism, how open one is to experiences, and how agreeable and conscientious they are. Then, participants were given a daily online diary and asked to respond to a questionnaire that measured tiredness and positive and negative mood. Examples of positive mood included feeling â€Å"active,† â€Å"alert,† â€Å"attentive,† â€Å"excited. † Examples of negative mood included feeling †Å"irritable,† â€Å"scared,† â€Å"upset,† â€Å"guilty. † Tiredness was measured by terms such as â€Å"sluggish,† â€Å"sleepy,† and â€Å"drowsy. The researchers found that when it’s sunny outside you’re in a more alert, happy, focused mood than when it’s raining, cloudy, snowing, and cold. Wind, temperature, and sunlight were found to have a negative effect on your mood. The researchers said that sunlight played a role in how tired people said they were. Also, Sunlight had a mitigating effect on whether people reported they were tired on days when it rained. Being out in the sun boosts our mood, improves sleep, and promotes vitamin D production.Some people get better sleep when they were exposed to the sun during the day. A type of depression called seasonal affective disorder affects some people during the winter when they don't get enough sunlight. Psychiatrists often recommend that depressed individuals go outside in the sun for 30 minutes per day because experts now believe that sunlight has widespread mood-elevating effects, possibly because the â€Å"happy† hormone serotonin increases when nights are short and days are long.When the day starts getting darker earlier more people have less time to enjoy any of the day because they are at school or work. so then they become depressed because they are getting home from work and school and its either cloudy out by the time they get out or its already dark out . Also experts said shorter day’s equal shorter sun/daylight which is why some people do become depressed and tired. Some people have less effect on their mood from weather which are identified those people who love winter and enjoy the colder weather and everything about the season.When it’s really hot outside or in a certain location it can cause you to get heat stress. Heat stress is the amount of stress a worker faces in a hot work area: temperature, humidity, rad iant heat (such as from the sun or a furnace) and wind speed. Individuals with high blood pressure or some heart conditions and people who take diuretics (water pills) may be more sensitive to heat exposure and may have a higher chance of getting heat stress.Rain and cloudy skies also plays a role in effecting your mood. Frijns and his colleagues also identified a group of so-called â€Å"Summer Haters,† who were less happy and more fearful and angry when the temperature and the percentage of sunshine were higher and happier and less fearful and angry with more hours of precipitation. Also identified a group called â€Å"Rain Haters† was also identified. As implied by the name, this group felt angrier and less happy on days with more precipitation.Some people say that they like sunny, warm day’s better than rainy cold days because when its sunny outside your able to be more active and also are able to go out and enjoy the sunny warm weather but other people say they like rainy cold days better because you get to relax inside, watch movies, spend more time with family, and be more focused on school or work other than putting your work off and going outside and enjoy your day. Researches said more college student tend to go to school doing the fall because they are more focused and pass more classes because theyaren’tputting off their work to enjoy a nice sunny warm day.Researches said that during the spring and summer people are more in shape and exercise than during the fall and winter. This is because during the spring and summer people are more motivated to go for a walk or run because the suns out and its warm out. Most people don’t like going out in the rain or cold. so that makes them unmotivated to be active and get exercise. Also most people tend to stay in during the fall and winter because it’s warm and dry inside rather than being outside in the cold and rain.Researches said that people tend to gain more weig ht during the winter and fall months because they are inside watching movies and eating rather than going outside and being active. People also get depressed during the fall and winter because of cold , rain , and cloudy skies and when most people are depressed they usually eat more to make them feel better which also make them gain weight. Researchers said there are several ways you can prevent the weather to affect your mood negatively. Some prevention is when you are indoors don’t have the lights dimmed turn then all the way on so it’s brighter in your house.You can also watch a movie cuddled up on your couch or bed and have a good dinner. Don’t just sit around and do nothing that makes you bored and depressed. Get up and do something like clean, make food, or go out. There is a diagnosis called â€Å"seasonal moodiness. † Seasonal moodiness is a sickness then affects 1 of 4 people. Its gloominess caused by Mother Nature and it usually starts in late O ctober, and then ends in April when spring begins. When this becomes more servers (having seasonal moodiness for 2 consecutive years) it usually becomes diagnosed as Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD).Doctors take this very seriously, and there is treatment. Doctors believe it stems from â€Å"sensitivity to the lack of sunlight that results from winter's â€Å"shorter† days and disrupts our circadian rhythm, or internal body clock. â€Å"- WebMD. SAD is caused by the brain working overtime to produce melatonin (because of the lack of sunlight). Melatonin regulates your body clock, sleep patterns and a hormone that's been linked to depression. So in this way, yes weather can affect our moods. Although it is an illness, it's caused to weather and weather change.