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ÊÊÊ Our group's goal is to prove the hypothesis that the weather has an
affect on a person's mood.Ê Our thesis is that in general, sunnier, warmer
days have a positive affect on a person's mood and colder, cloudier weather
has a negative affect.Ê We are not sure if this will prove to be true or not,
our alternative hypothesis is that weather has no affect on mood. An effect
on mood would be defined as a change in the way the person feels. For
example, a change from feeling happy and/or optimistic, to feeling sad and/or
depressed. We are going to look at many variable of weather, including
sunshine, temperature, cloudiness, precipitation among others.Ê On days that
people complete our survey, we will collect information from Hays's weather
center.
Articles-
Many studies have been conducted on the effects that weather has on our
everyday moods. It seems like all of the studies done show both similarities
and differences to the point that weather affects peoples' moods. Our group
has reviewed many articles that have useful information related to our topic.
Some of these articles lead us into the right direction while others had no
real relevance to our lab at all. Here are the ones that we will use for
future references.
ÊÊÊ The first article that we reviewed was entitled "No changes in mood with
the seasons" and was written by J. Hardt. Hardt discusses the fact that women
under the age of 51 are more often affected by seasonal affective disorders,
but in his study this fact was not true. He did an experiment that lasted a
five-year period on patients in a pain clinic in Germany. After analyzing his
data, Hardt came to the conclusion that the amount of sunlight in a day and
even the change in the seasons had little if any affect on depression. They
go on to say that they believe that seasonal affective disorder, as a true
disorder is probably rare.
ÊÊÊ "The origin of everyday moods: Managing energy, tension, and stress"
written by Robert Thayer is our second source that discusses the behaviors
that we all face each day and how they affect our mood. Thayer argues that we
need to learn to see our moods as "vital barometers" of our whole psychology
so that we can improve our personal effectiveness. With the improvements that
we need to learn we can improve ourselves not only mentally, but also
physically. Although weather is not mentioned as an individual factor, time
of day, health, and food we eat, and the amount of sleep we get each night
are.
ÊÊÊ "Mental health, mood and perceptual responses to meteorological
conditions" discusses the affects that weather has on mood. By using his
extensive knowledge and research on the topic of mood and weather to combine
findings of others to form a more comprehensive viewpoint. Cyr takes not only
qualitative research but also quantitative research and analyses both sides
and comes up with his own perspective. The use of summary tables,
scattergrams, histograms and clinical analysis were very important in his
work because he used many different categories. For example, Cyr broke
weather up into wind, heat, sun, rain, clouds, cold, storms, snow, thunder,
fog, ice, mist, dew, hail, and humidity. Results showed that humans respond
to conditions in the weather with immediate responses, such as fear or
amazement, with associations to their past history, such as a particular
stress related event.
ÊÊÊ Seasonal affective disorder was a diagnosis that was found in many
articles such as the "Effect of daily variation in weather and sleep on
seasonal affective disorder" written by Paul Albert. In this study, seasons
and weather were tested for their effects on sleep. When the ten patients
were held in a controlled environment, all ten showed significant seasonal
patterns in their sleep. On the other hand, only four of the ten subjects
showed significant effects to their condition when weather was the control.
Albert's results also dealt with energy, but the results were not relevant to
our particular study at this time.
ÊÊÊ Some of the articles dealt with the actual reactions of people in real
life situations, and not just those in a controlled environment. Ross Vickers
published his article entitled "Coping strategies and mood during cold
weather training." His experiment compared two different groups of Marines
after their training. Both groups had two different training sessions, one
during the cold winter months and the other session was held during the
summer in the mountains for warfare training. What they found was that the
Marines used other means of coping in the cold winter months such as thinking
of warmer, better places. This led to negative emotions and moods during
these time periods because they were forcing themselves to think of other
things. During the summer training the group found that since the weather was
nicer and easier to cope with, they tended to have better interactions and
the overall mood was not as negative.
ÊÊÊ Vickers wasn't the only person who decided to do studies on soldiers.
Richard Johnson also wrote an article entitled "Influence of attitude and
expectations on moods and symptoms during cold weather military training"
that focused not only on weather but also on the influences of everyday life.
Johnson looked at soldiers that were training in cold weather and came to
find that the more the soldiers disliked cold weather the more tense,
depressed and angry they became. This is a slightly different perspective
than others have in that the direct correlation between mood and weather is
not the main factor here. Although the colder the weather the higher the
symptoms of depression and anger in most soldiers, they also found that if
the soldieries were more inclined to the colder weather than others that
their symptoms were substantially lower. Johnson also contributed a great
deal to the individuals' lives outside of the military. Those with the most
stress in their lives at that particular time showed an increase in the
overall poor characteristics that dealt with mood.
ÊÊÊ While a lot of professionals like to examine the mood of individuals
during certain weather patterns, Detlev Kommer decided to see if he could
manipulate mood by controlling the weather. Kommer's method will serve as a
model for our own. Some of the subjects were asked to give their responses on
days that it was extremely sunny and nice outside, while at other times the
subjects were asked to answer the same questions on gloomy, overcast days.
Many questions were asked, such as how satisfied they were with their life
and how they expected their future to unfold. Although Detlev got very
detailed in his questions and observations, his ideas are very similar to
ours although his were more extensive than our experiment is able to be.
ÊÊÊ Sometimes it is important to continue a study for a set time period to
reduce the outside influences. E. Howarth did this when he conducted a study
of 24 male university students over an eleven-day period. Included in this
study were 10 mood variables, such as anxiety, potency, aggression, and
others. The weather variables included hours of sunshine, precipitation,
temperature. Howarth found that the major influences on mood were humidity,
temperature, and hours of sunshine. Although all of the other variables had
influences on particular aspect of mood, these had the greatest overall
affect.
ÊÊÊ Evaluating the results of an experiment can vary greatly between
different individuals. A great example of that are the results that Persinger
and Levesque reported in their study entitled "The weather matrix
accommodates large portions of variance of measured daily mood." They took
the results of a previous experiment and used regression lag analysis to
interpret the results in a more numeric manner. What they found was that four
to five major components of the weather matrix accommodated approximately 30
- 60% of the variance in daily mood for the individuals involved in the
experiment. They also ruled out some of the weather variables, such as
temperature, because of outside contaminants.
ÊÊÊ Jeffery Sanders of Towson State University conducted his experiment every
weekday morning for 5 straight weeks. His test was very simple, just a
checklist, and required very little thought from his respondents. After
collecting all the data needed from the survey he then collected weather
information from the National Weather Service for those time periods and
compared the results. What he found was that the major weather factor was
high humidity and that it correlated most consistently with vigor, social
affection, and elation.
ÊÊÊ There are hundreds of published experiments that are relevant to our
particular lab experiment. Some offers help more than others do because they
share a similar focus with ours. Others have very little, if anything, to do
with our experiment but still offer relevant models for testing design
procedure.
Materials and Methods-
To conduct our experiment we are going to conduct a survey.Ê Given out six
times to forty people each time.Ê We will use the same forty people the
duration of the experiment to ensure consistency.Ê Each member of our lab
group will be in charge of a group of ten people.Ê Our target number of
participants is thirty, but we will survey forty people to account for people
who fail to complete the study.Ê We will attempt to get students from all
over Miami's campus in order to get an accurate representative of the
population.Ê Because of the number of people being surveyed our data will be
statistically sound for Miami's campus only.Ê To try and remove bias from the
experiment we will not inform the people of the type of experiment that is
being performed.Ê They will be given no other directions or information other
than that they need to fill out the survey.Ê We will dispense and collect the
surveys the same day, within a few minutes of one another.Ê The surveys will
be given out at evenly spaced intervals between the end of October and the
end of November.Ê We cannot give a specific timeline detailing the exact days
that our survey will be handed out because the weather will determine the
days we hand out the survey.Ê More than likely, unless the weather remains
unchanged for an entire week, we will hand out surveys two times per week
from October 31st through November 30th.Ê The only materials needed to
conduct this experiment are the survey, participants, a calculator, and a
spreadsheet. As for the weather aspect we will determine what consitutes each
aspect of weather we are using in our evaluation.Ê For example when measuring
the amount of sunshine we will look at the UV index.Ê For cloudiness we will
determine percents of coverage as our basis for cloudy, partly cloudy, and
not cloudy.Ê Both temperature and precipitation will be directly measured.
Class Presentation-
ÊÊÊ When we present our study to the class, we are first going to describe
our hypothesis and the way in which we are going to conduct our study and
collect results.Ê We are going to try to have a discussion with the class,
finding out if they believe that weather affects their mood or if it has no
effect.Ê We are then going to give a copy of an article that has data that
supports our hypothesis to the class.Ê We will have the class read it and
then we will lead a discussion about it.Ê Next we are going to have each
member of the class fill out one of our surveys; this will give us some
results to analyze.Ê We are hoping to find a short video that supports are
study, but as of now we are not sure if we will be able to find a relevant
video or not.Ê Last, we are going to involve the class by attempting to
create different weather conditions in the room.Ê We are going to use a spray
bottle to create rain, a fan to create wind and hopefully a fog machine to
create fog.Ê We are going to have volunteers come up and we will impose these
different conditions on them in an attempt to see if these conditions
irritate them or affect their mood in any way.Ê We are hoping that this will
be an entertaining way to show people what we are testing.
A draft of our survey follows-
Name:
Year:
Gender:
Major:
1. Would you say you are a generally pessimistic or optimistic person?
(Circle one)
1ÊÊ 2ÊÊ 3ÊÊ 4ÊÊ 5ÊÊ 6ÊÊ 7ÊÊ 8ÊÊ 9ÊÊ 10
PessimisticÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ Optimistic
2.Ê On average, how many hours do you spend outside per day?
<1ÊÊÊÊ 1-2ÊÊÊÊ 2-3ÊÊÊÊ 3-4ÊÊÊÊ 4-5ÊÊÊÊ >5
3.ÊÊ In general, rate your stress level
ÊÊÊÊ 1ÊÊÊÊÊ 2ÊÊ 3ÊÊ 4ÊÊ 5ÊÊ 6ÊÊ 7ÊÊ 8ÊÊ 9ÊÊ 10
Low StressÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ High Stress
4.Ê Today, what is your stress level?
1ÊÊÊÊÊÊ 2ÊÊ 3ÊÊ 4ÊÊ 5ÊÊ 6ÊÊ 7ÊÊ 8ÊÊ 9ÊÊ 10
Low StressÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ High Stress
5.Ê (For Yourself) Last night did you get an
less than average amount of sleepÊÊ average amount of sleepÊÊÊÊÊ above
average amount of sleep
6.Ê Do you have an unusually large amount of work due soon?
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ YESÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ NO
7.Ê What words would you use to describe your mood today? (circle all that
apply)
StressedÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ CarefreeÊÊÊ AnxiousÊÊÊÊÊ HappyÊ DepressedÊÊ Content
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ RelaxedÊÊÊÊÊ Nervous
Results-
With our results we are going to make charts and graphs that will show the
results clearly.Ê For questions that do not have a numeric rating, we are
going to assign numeric values to answers give.Ê For example, for question 7,
we will put the adjectives on a scale, rating from one to eight; the most
positive adjectives being on the high end (8) and the negative adjectives
being on the low end (1.) We will present our results first in tables, and
then we will graphically represent our findings.Ê This will allow us to be
able to understand our data better to tell if good weather makes a difference
on people's moods. We will be looking for a correlation between better moods
and increased sunlight and less clouds and precipitation.
Works Cited
Albert, Paul S.; Rosen, Leora
ÊÊÊÊÊ N.; Alexander, Joseph R.; Rosenthal, Norman E.
ÊÊÊÊÊ Psychiatry Research Vol 36(1)1991 p.51-63 Elsevier
ÊÊÊÊÊ Scientific Publishers, US
Cunningham, Michael R. Journal of Personality & Social Psychology
ÊÊÊÊÊ Vol 37(11)1979 p.1947-1956 American Psychological Assn.,
ÊÊÊÊÊ US
Cyr, Kenneth A. Dissertation
ÊÊÊÊÊ Abstracts International: Section B: The Sciences &
ÊÊÊÊÊ Engineering Vol 56(2-B)1995 p.1088 Univ. Microfilms
ÊÊÊÊÊ International, US
Hardt, J.; Gerbershagen,
ÊÊÊÊÊ H. U. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica Vol 100(4)1999
ÊÊÊÊÊ p.288-294 Munksgaard Scientific Journals, US
Howarth, E.; Hoffman, M.
ÊÊÊÊÊ S. British Journal of Psychology Vol 75(1)1984 p.15-23
ÊÊÊÊÊ British Psychological Society, England
Johnson, Richard F.; Branch, Laurence G.; McMenemy,
ÊÊÊÊÊ Donna J. Aviation, Space, & Environmental Medicine Vol
ÊÊÊÊÊ 60(12)1989 p.1157-1162 Aerospace Medical Assn, US
Kommer, Detlev;Ê Schwarz, Norbert; Strack, Fritz; Bechtel, Gabriele
ÊÊÊÊÊ Zeitschrift fuer Klinische Psychologie, Psychiatrie und
ÊÊÊÊÊ Psychotherapie Vol 34(2)1986 p.127-139 Verlag Ferdinand
ÊÊÊÊÊ Schoningh, Germany
Thayer, Robert E. 1996 Oxford
ÊÊÊÊÊ University Press, New York, NY, US x, 276pp.
Persinger, M. A.;
ÊÊÊÊÊ Levesque, B. F. Perceptual & Motor Skills Vol 57(3, Pt
ÊÊÊÊÊ 1)1983 p.868-870 Perceptual & Motor Skills, US
Sanders, Jeffrey L.; Brizzolara, Mary S. Journal of General
ÊÊÊÊÊ Psychology Vol 107(1)1982 p.155-156 Heldref
ÊÊÊÊÊ Publications, US
Vickers, Ross R.; Kolar, David W.; Kelleher,
ÊÊÊÊÊ Dennis L. US Naval Health Research Center Report Rpt
ÊÊÊÊÊ No 89-471989 US Naval Health Research Center, US 14pp.
Whitton, Joel L.;
ÊÊÊÊÊ Kramer, Patricia M.; Eastwood, M. Robin Journal of
ÊÊÊÊÊ Psychosomatic Research Vol 26(2)1982 p.231-235 Elsevier
ÊÊÊÊÊ Science Inc., US
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