Mondays less miserable than Tuesdays, research finds
Conventional wisdom has been turned on its head by researchers at the London School of Economics, who have been monitoring the moodswings of 22,000 people.
Over a two-month period volunteers have been registering their state of mind with the help of an iPhone application called Mappiness,
The results have shown that Tuesday is when most people are at their lowest ebb.
“It seems plausible that on Monday the weekend has not quite worn off,” said George MacKerron, of LSE’s Department of Geography and Environment, who is running the project.
“By Tuesday they are well into the working week and the following weekend is not yet in sight.”
The information has been gathered by sending an alert to volunteers’ iPhones twice a day.
They are asked how they feel, who they are with, whether they are at home and what they are doing.
Their exact position is logged at the same time by satellite – using the same technology as employed in car navigation systems.
This also enabled researchers to discover the happiest – and indeed unhappiest – places in the country.
Thus far Bournemouth is the happiest place in the country, with 82 per cent of respondents seeming pretty content.
Life is rather less cheerful in the City of London, Eastbourne and Slough, where the Office comedy series was set.
Much could be learned from the research, Mr MacKerron added.
“By tracking across space as well as time, and by making novel use of a technology that millions of people already carry with them, we hope to find better answers to questions about the impacts of natural beauty, environmental problems – maybe even aspects of climate – on individual and national wellbeing.”
Forget manic Monday, terrible Tuesday is really the most depressing day of the week
From: Daily Mail
12 October 2010
If you woke up this morning thinking the toughest day of the week had been and gone, you were wrong.
Mondays may have long been thought of as miserable, but we’re more likely to feel down in the dumps on a Tuesday.
According to researchers from the London School of Economics, our moods are at their brightest on Saturday, with the weekend feelgood factor continuing into Sunday.
But while levels of contentment drop when the working week begins on Monday, it is on Tuesday that we reach our lowest ebb.
Academics used an iPhone application called Mappiness to log the moods of 22,000 participants over two months.
‘It seems plausible that on Monday the weekend has not quite worn off,’ said George MacKerron, from LSE’s Department of Geography and Environment.
The data was collated by sending alerts to volunteers’ mobile phones twice a day.
The messages asked how they felt, who they were with, where they were and what they were doing.
Using satellite navigation systems, their exact locations were also logged – allowing the scientists to pinpoint the happiest parts of the country.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the highest levels of contentment were found in seaside towns, with Bournemouth and Dorset coming top.
But things were less cheerful for those in the City of London, Eastbourne and Slough – the setting for Ricky Gervais’s comedy series The Office.
生词记录
conventional 传统的，常规的，普通的
monitor 监视，检查
moodswing 情绪波动
ebb 衰退，衰竭；落潮
plausible 貌似真实可信的；花言巧语的，巧舌如簧的
wear off 逐渐消失，消逝
satellite 卫星
respondent 回答者，答复者
content 满意的
manic 十分兴奋的；躁狂的，焦躁不安的
down in the dumps 情绪低落，不高兴
collate 校对，对照；检点，整理
pinpoint 查明，准确地说出，描述（事实真相）
