It will take more than showers to dampen Jubilee
A few years ago a group of psychologists in the United States took it upon themselves to answer the eternal question: does life really seem better on a sunny day?
It is a subject upon which there has been plenty of research but few definitive answers. One study, published in 1979, found people behave more altruistically on sunny days. Another, in 2003, claimed stock market returns are higher when the weather is fine.
To put such claims to the test, over a five-year period the researchers assessed more than a million Americans to examine the link between daily weather conditions and life satisfaction. Participants were asked to assess the happiness they derived out of life on a scale of one to four, researchers then mapped this against the weather.
The evidence was not as clear as you might expect. While there are obvious days when there is a clear correlation between the two – such as the first sight of sunshine after weeks of rain – overall, the study found the weather does not reliably affect people’s judgments about life satisfaction.
The changeable forecast this weekend helps explain why this remains such a grey area. It will be prone to the odd downpour and, due to a plume of warm air blowing over from Europe, we could at times see the sort of rain that turns a slice of Victoria sponge to exactly that.
And yet, with open air jubilee lunches being held across the country, it will also be a joyous time no matter how often we are forced to break out the brollies.
Mercifully, living as we do on this rain-lashed isle, we long ago discovered that we don’t need the sunshine to keep our spirits bright. And, as anyone knows, it takes more than a few downpours to dislodge a picnic. Perhaps then, here lies the secret which has baffled science for so long: there are some days when our spirits soar, regardless of what the weather throws at us.