Re: how are people's moods and health affected by the weather?

ACCESSION NUMBER:  1985-01286-001 
DOCUMENT TYPE:  Journal Article 
AUTHOR:  Howarth, E.; Hoffman, M. S. 
AFFILIATION:  U Alberta, Edmonton, Canada 
TITLE:  A multidimensional approach to the relationship between mood and 
weather. 
SOURCE:  British Journal of Psychology. Vol 75(1), Feb 1984, 15-23. 
Well, that is and extremely broad question. There are certainly many ways 
in which the weather might affect people's behavior, and behavior affects 
health. In recent years, a new category of depression has been related to 
amount of light people are exposed to, which is related to season. In the 
winter time, certain people are more prone to become depressed, and we 
think it has something to do with not getting enough light exposure. 

When I checked the psychological literature for information about mood and 
weather,only 7 articles came up between the years of 1984 and 1998. I am 
including the abstract of one study, which you might find interesting, 
below. If you're interested, you can get the full article for yourself, 
which will describe in detail exactly what the authors did and what they 
discovered. It will also include references to other articles on the topic.

AUTHOR:  Howarth, E.; Hoffman, M. S. 
AFFILIATION:  U Alberta, Edmonton, Canada 
TITLE:  A multidimensional approach to the relationship between mood and 
weather. 
SOURCE:  British Journal of Psychology. Vol 75(1), Feb 1984, 15-23. 
ISSN/ISBN:  0007-1269 
LANGUAGE:  English 
ABSTRACT:  10 mood variables were related to 8 weather 

LANGUAGE:  English 
ABSTRACT:  10 mood variables were related to 8 weather variables in a 
multidimensional study in which 24 male university students filled out a 
mood questionnaire over 11 consecutive days. The mood variables included 
concentration, cooperation, anxiety, potency, aggression, depression, 
sleepiness, skepticism, control, and optimism. The weather variables 
included hours of sunshine, precipitation, temperature, wind direction, 
wind velocity, humidity, change in barometric pressure, and absolute 
barometric pressure. Humidity, temperature, and hours of sunshine had the 
greatest effect on mood. High levels of humidity lowered scores on 
concentration while increasing reports of sleepiness. Rising temperatures 
lowered anxiety and skepticism mood scores. Humidity was the most 
significant predictor in regression and canonical correlation analysis. 
Implications for school and office performance that highlight the 
importance of humidity as a weather variable are discussed. (25 ref) ((c) 
1997 APA/PsycINFO, all rights reserved). 
KEY PHRASE:  weather variables, moods, male college students, implications 
for school & office performance 
MAJOR DESCRIPTORS:  Atmospheric Conditions; Emotional States 
MINOR DESCRIPTORS:  Adulthood; Job Performance; School Learning 
CLASSIFICATION CODE:  3120 Personality Traits & Processes 
POPULATION:  Human; Adulthood (18 yrs & older) 
FORM/CONTENT TYPE:  Empirical Study