HAPPY FALL!!!

The best part of the year is just beginning! Prepare for a season full of football, comfy sweaters, pumpkin spice lattes, HomeGoods and T.J. Maxx runs, the color-changing of the leaves, and weather that begins to cool down from its warm predecessor, but is somehow just right. The love for fall has shown to be widespread around the United States, with 45% of Americans declaring it to be their favorite season. This is nearly double the next favorite (Summer with 24%) according to a recent survey from ValleyPenguin. Why do Americans love this season so much though? 

If you’re here now, you are most likely aware (I hope) that this blog is about diving into the scientific explanations of what constitutes the world. Whether or not you’d like to admit it, there’s a scientific explanation for almost anything, and explaining the psychology of why most of the country holds this opinion of fall is no exception. 

The psychology behind this phenomenon can stem from multiple factors like perception, weather, and comfort, just to name a few. The perception the majority of people tend to hold for autumn comes from past experiences and nostalgia that pre-condition them to feel excited. We begin to anticipate events like Halloween, decorating our houses, going back to school, and seeing friends that condition us to unconsciously make associations with these times that make us the happiest, building the excitement up to fall. 

However, just as there are positive perceptions of fall, there are also those that associate the very things that are seen in a positive light by another with a sign that things are turning to the worse. Psychologist Kathryn Roecklein at the University of Pittsburgh’s Department of Psychology claims that “People who are dreading the winter are not able to enjoy all these fall holidays and all the things that the broader population loves,..“ and feel disconnected from the paradise of the world perceived by others, trapped in their negative associations of the season. 

One anatomical contributor that is very interesting to observe is the idea that the cooling of temperatures has a stimulating effect on our brains. Generally, normal brain functions like forming memories, thinking, and learning are linked to internal glucose levels and efficiency in the brain (Harvard Medical School). In the summer, the brain uses up this glucose from the brain to cool down the body which can lead to effects like fogginess and decreased brain efficiency. Cooler temperatures have shown an increase in clarity and preservation in glucose levels, facilitating normal brain functions, according to psychologist Yasmine Saad. If you’re having trouble concentrating this fall from school or work, try taking a walk outside to breathe and regain some clarity. Take a look at the scenery and flora around you as a bonus! 

Finally, the social aspect of comfort can play a role in a favorable opinion towards this season. The transition from summer to fall oversees the shift from bikini season to the classic sweater weather. With the colder weather comes a decrease in pressure to maintain the “ideal body” type that typically leads to negative self-image and body shaming during warmer seasons. This climate calls for warmer clothes and the normalization of bulk clothing that decreases harmful stereotypes that can bring a level of comfort towards this point in the year for individuals. 

Overall, an affinity for fall is very common in the United States due to the culture and the perceptions built around it by the individual, however, it is not for everyone. It can have an effect on increased brain efficiency and clarity that can increase productivity during colder climates, which paired with nostalgia can make this part of the year more desirable to others.

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Sources:

https://www.verywellmind.com/the-psychological-reason-why-we-love-fall-so-much-5205863  

https://www.eviemagazine.com/post/the-psychological-scientific-reasons-on-why-we-love-fall-autumn 

https://www.bustle.com/wellness/why-are-people-so-obsessed-with-fall-experts-explain-your-love-for-autumn-18735529 

https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/fall-is-americans-favorite-season-survey-shows/ 

https://hms.harvard.edu/news-events/publications-archive/brain/sugar-brain 

Shifting gears to a modern-day topic, issues like climate change and overall global warming have been observed to increase even more rapidly in recent years with increased human activity and innovation. We may not have had to monitor this issue as heavily in the past, however, with the increasing population and industry, we could be living through its effects more frequently in our lives, making it an important topic to be knowledgeable about.

Global warming describes the increase in global temperature and encompasses the effects of climate change. It’s important in your life because the use of fossil fuels contributes to the increased abundance of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere that cause a temperature rise, affecting weather patterns, flooding, ecosystems, and human health. 

When the sun radiates light onto the Earth, some of the light is absorbed and some is sent back into space. Instead of simply transmitting back into space, however, greenhouse gasses will trap some of the light under a “blanket” in the atmosphere to heat the earth in what is called the greenhouse effect. This is a natural effect and is generally seen as beneficial since it keeps the planet warm, increasing the annual temperature to a stable amount each year. The increased concentration of these greenhouse gasses, however, traps excess heat from the sun and warms the earth even further, increasing the annual temperature by speeding up the process of warming. 

The main causes of the rise in global annual temperature can be attributed to natural influences, human activity, and industry evolution in the past two hundred years. Naturally occurring processes like volcanic eruptions can affect global warming, however, it is not as comparable to the role that humans play. The burning of fossil fuels as energy: coal, oil, and gas, revolutionized technology in the early Industrial Revolution by creating new and more efficient means for energy production. Factories were built, capitalizing on these new forms of energy to maximize company output performance. Modern industry continues to use fossil fuels in the creation of their products and has given the power to individuals with the sale of gas cars.   

This information is important to know because the majority of people own cars and are contributing to the growing amount of fossil fuels in the atmosphere simply by owning a gas car. That isn’t to say that there aren’t other methods that produce more emissions, but it is important to understand our role in the climate crisis and how we can as individuals help lower those levels. As is being seen now, the rise in global temperature levels from human activity in the past two hundred years is causing oceans to become more warm and acidic, killing the ecosystems that live there, causing more floods with rising sea levels, fluctuating climate, and increasing the likelihood and danger of infectious diseases from air pollution. Climate change and global warming are only growing out of demand for these fossil fuels, which unfortunately means that the effects we are seeing now will only become more common and begin to grow more irreversible as time progresses. 

Overall, it is important to be knowledgeable about climate change because it is an issue that has become more relevant as of the modern day with the rapid increase in annual temperature and will continue to have an effect on our lives in the future if work is not done to combat it.    

Have you ever witnessed an illusion that left you awe-struck? Whether it would be from birthday party magicians to those weird recommended videos on YouTube (that we ALL have watched at some time), somewhere, at some point your brain has been fooled. Magicians have been able to deceive our perceptions with their mastery of sleight of hand, but what about any illusions that don’t use this technique? Thankfully, we don’t need a magician to know the “secrets” of light interactions, so we can try examining those.

Here’s an example of a pure illusion that you may have seen before and that I had been reintroduced to in my general chemistry course this past week. Take a look at the image of the colored circle. Focus on it by staring at the white dot in the middle for 30 seconds. After 30 seconds, look at the white space on the right and blink rapidly. Can you tell the difference? If you did it correctly (congrats, you’re not color blind!), you would have noticed how the colors in the 3 arcs: blue, red, and green, have changed into different colors: yellow, cyan, and purple-like respectively. How does this trick work though?  

To examine this, we need some background knowledge about light and its interactions with matter. Simply put, light is a form of energy that is dual-behavioral depending on whether the wave-like behavior of electromagnetic waves or the particle-like behavior of photons (quantum of light) is being observed. Let’s first examine light under the scope of wave behavior. 

Waves can be interpreted in many ways through defining characteristics of their oscillations; some of these being the wavelength (peak-to-peak or troph-to-troph distance), frequency (the rate at which waves pass through a single point), speed (a constant “c”= 3 x 108m/s), and amplitude (height/intensity of light). Generally, frequency and wavelength are inverse to one another, since increasing the frequency of a wave means the distance between wavelengths will shorten and vice versa. 

If we were trying to identify the properties of waves, we would do so by examining their wavelengths. The spectrum of electromagnetic waves can represent this visually for us. The range of these wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation varies from microscopic units of angstroms (1 x 10^-10m) which are found in highly energetic gamma rays to kilometers (1 x 10^2m), found in radio frequencies. Visible light represents a narrow region of this spectrum that can be seen by the human eye from 400-750 nm and contains the various wavelengths of this range corresponding to different colors of the rainbow (we’re getting somewhere). 

Since we just analyzed light interactions with wave behavior, it’s only fitting we complement it with the applications of the interaction of light with matter. There are four notable light interactions with matter: emission, absorption, reflection, and radiation. For the sake of relevance, we will only be discussing absorption. Absorption occurs when white light is transmitted through an object, while the wavelengths of its complementary color (as seen on the color wheel), are absorbed by and contribute energy to the solution (this is what’s important). You may be thinking, “Why would the complementary color of a solution be absorbed instead of the color being transmitted through?” To expand on that, that’s just the way it is. Since Isaac Newton discovered white light could be separated into colors, he was able to arrange this relationship into what is now a color wheel, revolutionizing what complementary colors would be. 

How we observe colors is determined by how our eyes process them. Physiologically, the photons in the visible range of electromagnetic waves are detected by the cone and rod cells in the retina and are then processed by the optic nerves in the back of the eye to be interpreted by the brain. 

There is still more to this topic, but the information we have now is sufficient enough to come to a conclusion about the illusion mentioned in the beginning. 

The illusion of the changed colors was able to fool our brains because normally our eyes subconsciously process visual light in absorption for us, presenting the result of the transmission and residue of the complimentary wavelengths through the corresponding color of the object. Once those receptors were overworked (staring for 30 seconds), a temporary image with complementary colors was able to be seen when continuously blinking. The disconnect from the overworked receptors allowed us to get a glimpse of the conversion for ourselves in a simple, but fun little optical illusion. 

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Attached here is another cool example of this illusion with Ryan Gosling as Ken from the Barbie Movie if you would like to try!