If you feel down during a downpour, it's not your imagination: Bad weather can indeed have a negative effect on your emotions. According to one study, nearly 9 percent of people fall into the “rain haters” category. This group feels angrier and less happy on days with more precipitation.
Rainy days are most often known to contribute to depression and sadness. This is due to the dip in serotonin levels caused by lack of sunshine. The dip in serotonin levels also contributes to food cravings for comfort foods and carbohydrates because they boost serotonin levels.
Your body makes the hormone melatonin in part to help you feel the urge to sleep and to wake. Low amounts of sunlight may trigger a reduction in serotonin, which can affect your mood, Yeager says.
For example, events such as extreme storms or extreme heat can lead to depression, anger, and even violence. Everyone is at risk, but not everyone is affected equally.
Serotonin is a hormone that is vital for mood control. Depression-like symptoms are more likely when serotonin levels are low, especially during the rainy season, which is one of the characteristics of seasonal affective disorder.
If you feel down during a downpour, it's not your imagination: Bad weather can indeed have a negative effect on your emotions. According to one study, nearly 9 percent of people fall into the “rain haters” category. This group feels angrier and less happy on days with more precipitation.
Hot temperatures can increase stress hormones, and the feelings and symptoms of anxiety. Adverse weather events, such as intense thunder storms, strong winds, hail, and tornados can cause an increase in anxiety for those who worry about adverse weather events.
Exposure to sunlight is thought to increase the brain's release of a hormone called serotonin. Serotonin is associated with boosting mood and helping a person feel calm and focused. At night, darker lighting triggers the brain to make another hormone called melatonin. This hormone is responsible for helping you sleep.
Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) is a type of depression that comes and goes in a seasonal pattern. SAD is sometimes known as "winter depression" because the symptoms are usually more apparent and more severe during the winter. Some people with SAD may have symptoms during the summer and feel better during the winter.
A low pressure system, also known as a depression occurs when the weather is dominated by unstable conditions. Under a depression air is rising, forming an area of low pressure at the surface. This rising air cools and condenses and helps encourage cloud formation, so the weather is often cloudy and wet.
Weather affects our moods, temperaments, depression and outlook. It can also affect people's personalities. While mildly warm temperatures might be pleasant, soaring hot temperatures can cause people to become aggressive.
The sun boosts our mood
This is down to the link between sunlight and our serotonin levels – the hormone that makes us feel happy. It's also why people are more likely to develop Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) when the shorter autumn days arrive and we creep into winter with fewer daylight hours.
Some people associate their happiest memories with long summer days and experiencing the benefits of the warmer months. However for people with anxiety disorders, the heat may increase their symptoms of anxiety, and the summer months can feel the most difficult to face.
Advance preparation – thinking about where you will take shelter, making sure you have several ways to get weather warnings and information, and having a plan for you and your family – can help reduce your fear and stress levels when storms are in the area.
People with astraphobia feel extreme anxiety or debilitating fear when preparing for a thunderstorm. They may watch weather reports obsessively or have panic attacks (rushes of anxiety that cause intense physical symptoms) during a storm.
The dip in serotonin levels caused by the lack of sun on rainy days can create food cravings, especially for comforting carbohydrates such as bread and pasta. This may in part be a response to symptoms of depression associated with gloomy weather, as carbohydrates temporarily boost serotonin levels and improve mood.
The research revealed that cortisol, which is the stress hormone is lower in winter and tends to rise when the temperatures begin to soar. According to the researchers they saw cortisol circulating in the body during warm weather.
RAIN is a process that was developed by Michelle McDonald as part of the mindfulness movement, which is characterized by an emphasis on maintaining awareness of your surroundings and the thoughts and feelings that accompany them without judgement. This means no reliving the past, and no preparing for the future.
Heavy rainfall can lead to numerous hazards, for example: flooding, including risk to human life, damage to buildings and infrastructure, and loss of crops and livestock. landslides, which can threaten human life, disrupt transport and communications, and cause damage to buildings and infrastructure.
Rain is nostalgic; rain is melancholic; rain is first love; rain is lost love; rain is madness, rain is magic; rain is wisdom, rain is freedom, and sometimes, benediction. Perhaps deep within all of us is the knowledge that rain is life itself and all our emotions towards it are just us being grateful that it pours.
There are also great opportunities for sunbathing. Warmer climates help boost the moods – Increase outdoor activities can make you feel better and alleviate depression.