Come rain or shine: Why people who live in sunnier locations 'no happier'

It's not the weather that's the problem, it's your attitude towards it!

By Dave Lancaster |

15:52 28 May 2014

Paul Dolan, Professor of Behavioral Science at the London School of Economics, has concluded based on studies that people only feel down during periods of bad weather because they dwell on it.

 

Speaking to the Hay Festival, the professor said that those who live in warmer and sunny locales were no happier. 

 

Professor Dolan said: “A study was done which assessed the happiness levels of people in California compared to the North West.

 

“They expected that people in California would be happier because it is more sunny but they found that levels of happiness were exactly the same.

 

“If it is sunny every day you get used to it and the sunshine doesn’t make you any happier.

 

“Most of the time the weather doesn’t affect our wellbeing at all. But when we think about it, and think that it does, that’s when we get miserable. “

 

The professor was promoting his new book, ‘Happiness By Design’, when he suggested that we can all think ourselves happier if we "manage a reallocation of our time towards both pleasure and purpose.”

 

Professor Dolan's influence in the field of happiness is considerable, having been drafted by the Office for National Statistics to work out new measures for happiness and wellbeing.