Summer-Haters Get Happy as Days Get Shorter

The Wall Street Journal:

Many people get the blues as winter sets in. They experience rolling back the clock to end daylight-saving time and commuting home in the dark as a downer.

Not so for Travis Hare. “I prefer colder temps and shorter days,” says Mr. Hare, co-principal of a Washington, D.C., marketing and public-relations firm. The 34-year-old hikes in the snow, vacations in Iceland and regards a day at the beach as a hot, sweaty bore. “The only time I like things hot is when I’m having coffee—preferably when it’s cold outside,” he says. “People complain about snow, while I hope every potential flake turns into a blizzard.”

A small, quiet minority of people actually cheer up and draw energy from the long, dark days of winter. These summer-haters, as one study calls them, are miserable and restless from May through September, when others are overjoyed to be getting outside. “It’s a lonely world for people like us,” Mr. Hare says. Recent research is shedding light on the possible causes of the summer blues and ways to cope.

Read the whole story: The Wall Street Journal