For years people have been debating about the effects of weather on the mood. Does a belligerent army of grey clouds in the
sky put a frown on your face? And how about the warm rays of the sun? Who hasn't felt low and depressed when running home under a thunderstorm or irritable, moody and even hostile in sizzling sunshine?
The official acknowledgment of SAD (Seasonal Mood Disorder) in the '80s has helped create a more understanding approach to the link of mood to weather, but scepticism is still rampant in warm and cold countries alike despite individual evidence of inevitable
correlation.
The Seasonal Mood Disorder is a syndrome brought about by our body time clock or circadian rhythm going out of sync for a lack of ultraviolet light. Such lacking upsets our body routine and our system is thrown into confusion with the brain secreting more melatonin, a sleep-inducing hormone, thus bringing about symptoms of depression, sadness, lethargy, fatigue, apathy, with a consequent reduction in
physical activity and an increase in carbohydrates intake causing our weight to soar.
Several studies have suggested a significant relationship between seasonal changes in meteorological variables and the incidence of suicide.
Souetre, et al in 1987, Sali and Gray ten years later and Preti the same year all concluded that higher temperatures, increased daylight duration, and more sunshine hours have an impact on the causes of higher suicide rate in the summer months. Linkowski, et al (1992), and Kok and Tsoi ('93) found that there is a negative correlation between the number of suicides and the hours of sunlight and Wehr and Rosenthal, as early as '89, hinted that factors that trigger summer and winter depression might be risk factors for suicide.
A recent study conducted by three eminent researchers, Brian Jacobs of JFK School of Government, Lars Lefgren of BYU, and Enrico Moretti of UC-Berkeley in their paper on The Dynamics of Criminal Behaviour. Evidence of Weather Shocks on SSRN nullified any direct correlation between weather and crime, and found that the results do not appear to be driven by persistence in weather condition.
It appears that people getting out and about more in summer months making themselves ‘targets for criminals’ bring about the increase in crime rate according to Capt. Bill Benton of the Cleveland County Sheriff's Office. The same theory finds validation with Lori Dougovito of WILX 10 in her Cold Weather Decrease Crime report in which she states that the local police records a decrease in the number of calls coming in, as well as the number of actual crimes, in the colder months 'due to the snow being too deep and the temperature too cold.'
On a lighter note and with more satisfactory results recent studies have noticed a correlation between weather and physical activity. It seems that in cold countries individuals' physical activity increase, presumably to get warm, whereas in tropical countries there is a sensible decrease of any activity (siesta anyone?) where people tend to look for shaded shelters to diminish their body temperature.
Ray Merril of the Bringham Young University in his study published in the Journal Health Behaviour finds that the highest physical activity is performed in summer (48.8), followed by spring (46.2), fall (45.8) and winter (44.6) and that barriers to a more active behaviour are identified as being poor and hot weather.
With the majority of the world population being indoors 93% of the time a successful assessment of weather and mood has never been easy, however according to a study conducted by the University of Michigan 72F is the perfect climate condition for the human body to perform at its best. It is then, with the sun shining and the warm rays on our skin, that our memory, mood and cognitive style thrive making us more open to information and creative thoughts, more inclined to get off the bus two stops earlier, walking to the corner shop instead of driving, having a picnie park with our friends and family, or a stroll along the beach with our lover. It is in this blissful climate that we feel more optimistic, smiley, happy, active and in harmony with life.
Do you know what the weather is going to be like today? Put on a pair of comfortable walking shoes, a touch of greenery in the city, and some ultraviolet light in the sky. Thirty minutes a day. Guaranteed to kill off that blues and get you ready for the day ahead.