Daisy Fancourt
Appearances
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
Also in this podcast, there's a really clear time of day that many people feel better. And that's the first thing in the morning. typically between about 6 o'clock and 10 o'clock in the morning. People also have a little bit of a peek towards the early evening.
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
We've been looking at data from over 50,000 people who've contributed over a million observations between them. And what we found is that there's a really clear time of day that many people feel better. And that's first thing in the morning, typically between about 6 o'clock and 10 o'clock in the morning. People also have a little bit of a peak towards the early evening.
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
But after about eight o'clock in the evening, I'm afraid it's a bit of a downhill.
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
We found that this pattern is pretty consistent across all the days of the week and times of the year. But we actually found that on the weekends, these effects are really heightened. So people are even happier, even fewer depressive and anxiety symptoms first thing in the morning.
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
And we also found that during the summer months, the overall levels of all of these results are better across the day.
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
So this was a really interesting sample because it was people who were actually taking part in research during the COVID-19 pandemic. So they were contributing data every single week throughout the first two years of the pandemic, which is why we've got such rich follow-up data on them.
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
It also meant that we had a really clean period when people were in lockdown, so not necessarily going to work, and there was a disruption of their usual patterns. And in fact, we were still seeing the same variation across the day, what we call a diurnal variation, even in those periods when people's lives were very disrupted and even when people weren't actually working in those periods.
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
And noticeably, We were finding that this result isn't actually affected by daylight. It's not to do with when the day is getting lighter or darker. It seems to be a more embedded difference in people's responses across the day.
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
I think one of the clear takeaways is that in the evenings, people can be aware that their mood is likely to get worse. They're likely to have higher symptoms of low mood or anxiety, lower levels of happiness. and less satisfaction with things in their lives.
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
But it can also just be a good reminder for all of us sometimes about the benefits of an early morning and getting up and making the most of that time when we are probably more likely to be reporting better mental health.
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
One of the things that was quite surprising was that Tuesdays and Wednesdays, that midweek period, we actually don't tend to see as greater benefits for mental health in the early hours of the day. And this could be that because if people are working by that time in the week, you are quite into the rhythm of things and perhaps not feeling quite so optimistic.
Global News Podcast
UN Secretary-General warns US against 'ethnic cleansing' in Gaza
There's still a while to go before you get to the weekend. So that can be another thing people can be aware of is that Tuesdays and Wednesday mornings they might not feel quite as good as other days of the week.