A study using online and social media posts in the United States found that people tend to feel worse during the two annual transitions to daylight saving time (spring) and standard time (fall). This deterioration in mood becomes more pronounced after the change to standard time in the fall. The paper was published in pro swan.
Seasonal time change is the practice of adjusting your clock twice a year. In the spring, usually in March, clocks are moved forward one hour to enter daylight savings time. This change is described as one hour of sleep “lost.” In the fall, usually in October or November, clocks are set back one hour to standard time. This is known as “earning” an extra hour of sleep.
The purpose of these changes is to make better use of sunlight during longer days. In spring, the nights are bright, but the mornings are dark. In autumn, the mornings become brighter and the nights darken earlier. These changes can temporarily affect your sleep patterns and daily activities.
However, research has shown that changes over time are associated with negative national sentiment. This shift can also disrupt sleep patterns, increase the risk of accidents and health problems, and impair cognitive function. There is an ongoing debate about whether to adopt permanent daylight savings time or permanent standard time, as each has different impacts on sleep, health, and daily life.
Daylight saving time is currently used in most of the United States and Canada, parts of Australia and New Zealand, and most countries in Europe. Many countries near the equator have discontinued its use or have not adopted it at all, as solar variation throughout the year is minimal. Similarly, Russia and Türkiye have also stopped changing their clocks.
Study author Ben Elman and his colleagues conducted a study that used social media to measure how public sentiment changed before and after the time shift. They hypothesized that negative sentiment would be even stronger immediately after the clock change, and that this negative sentiment would become even stronger in the fall.
The authors collected daily data on social media mentions and sentiment surrounding these events over a 20-day period. The dataset used for analysis was collected using the Quid (formerly Netbase) social media listening platform.
Researchers defined a set of key terms to use in social media searches. This includes DST, #DST, daylight savings time, extended time, hour gain, hour loss, standard time, and #Timechange. Analyzing posts made between 2019 and 2023, the study authors collected a total of 821,140 mentions.
The researchers didn’t just look at the entire United States. They specifically looked for posts originating from cities within 100 miles of U.S. time zone boundaries. By comparing sentiment in cities just west of the time zone boundary on the day of the time change to sentiment in cities just east of the boundary the previous day, the researchers were able to isolate the “shock” of the time change itself, while keeping variables such as weather and daylight hours relatively constant.
The authors used Quid’s natural language processor to examine the tone and context of posts. Each post was assigned a sentiment value from -100 to 100 depending on whether it expressed a positive or negative mood. We also had Quid’s processor categorize mentions by unique terms that drive sentiment for each key term.
They found that the average number of mentions per day of time-varying terms in the national dataset was 32,271, with large variations from day to day. The US East and Pacific regions had the highest number of daily mentions. Overall, average national sentiment during daylight saving time (positive: 5.65) was better than during standard time (minus: -13.02).
Ultimately, the results revealed negative shocks to sentiment after both time changes. However, the results after migration were different. The researchers found that the decline in negative mood after the change to daylight saving time in the spring attenuated (recovered) relatively quickly, but that negative emotions after the change to standard time in the fall lasted for a longer period of time.
“These findings provide evidence that individuals react more negatively to a change in social time to standard time in the fall than to daylight saving time in the spring. This study highlights the possibility that reactions to changes in social time may differ depending on whether one is moving to or away from daylight saving time or standard time,” the study authors concluded.
This study adds to scientific knowledge about how people respond to changes in time. However, the authors note that emotions over time depend on complex behavioral responses and demographic characteristics that were not observed in this study. Because social media usage patterns vary from person to person, these differences in responses may not be fully or adequately reflected by social media posts alone.
“Social media analysis reflects the negative emotions experienced during both periods of change, with a mildly depressing impact in early fall,” the paper was written by Ben Elman, Michael L. Smith, Carson Rieling, and Nicole J. Olink Widmer.
