How the weather impacts what school you go to, what you buy, and how you perform at work.

We all know the weather can have a tremendous impact on our daily outlook…

Increased sunshine is associated with better moods AND an increased willingness to help others.

In contrast, Seasonal Affective Disorder (characterized by depressive symptoms) is brought on by the winter months.

But, how does the weather really influence our happiness?

2 powerful ways in

#1  

JUDGEMENT

good weather vs. bad weather

they weighted academic

accomplishments of applicants more heavily on cloudy

days.

and weighted extra-curricular activities more

heavily on sunny days,

When the weather turns bad,

We are more prone to think

rationally about the problems set before us.

Bad weather can also help boost performance of

short-term memory.

#2  

PRODUCTIVITY

Productivity increases in the workplace when weather is bad, compared to when it is sunny outside.

Employees at banks entered data faster when it was raining outside.

You might have predicted this, because we just discussed how bad weather leads us to be more analytical

and perhaps, therefore, more focused on completing cerebral tasks.

But the effect is present in the manual labor industry as well.

Automobile makers tend to

be more efficient when the weather is

subpar.

So, why does the weather play this big a role?

Through the eyes of the

economist we can think about

opportunity costs*.

the benefits you could have received by taking an alternative action.

Opportunity Costs (defined) :  

In terms of threat to leisure,

doing work is more costly on

sunny days than on rainy days.

If there’s no leisure cost to doing work (as there’s not on cloudy days) the rational choice is to stay inside, do work and, presumably, make money, gain respect, etc.  

Through the eyes of a psychologist we can analyze the priming and

distraction effects at play.

If it’s nice outside, you will be primed to think about all the fun things you could do if you weren’t in the office, and therefore be distracted from the task at hand.

In this case, it’s a subconscious mechanism, not a rational thought process, that is causing you to be less productive.

In a recent study, participants made more mistakes and were less efficient when they were reminded of outside options.

This study suggests it is indeed the distraction of nice weather that also drives the effects discussed, not necessarily just the tendency of bad weather to induce analytical and rational thinking.

http://blog.tiptaplab.com/How-the-Weather-Impacts-Your-Work-Habits-and-Buying-Behavior

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