For those who are in Ball State University, it’s the week before finals, and that means everyone is dead tired from all that studying. But did you know weather can also make you tired? Well, that’s because they trick your brain and body into thinking that it’s time to sleep.
This is mostly because, with rain comes clouds, and clouds block the Sun’s rays from reaching us. Our bodies use sunlight as a means of stopping melatonin production and increasing seratonin. Your body produces Melatonin to induce sleep, and it produces Seratonin to induce happiness and motivation. Effectively, losing the Sun via rain-producing clouds means your brain continues to tell your body that it’s time to sleep, messing with your internal clock and making you drowsy.
It doesn’t help that rain also produces copious amounts of “pink noise,” a variation of the white noise phenomenon. Research suggests pink noise helps to calm a person down, which might induce sleep.
In other words, today’s weather is just dull enough to trick your body into thinking it’s time to sleep via a bit of chemistry and noise. So if you’re feeling tired today, don’t feel too bad.
-Weather Forecaster Joseph Williams
