How to Help Your Body Adjust to Colder Weather

Fall is here, and the mercury is falling in thermostats across the northern hemisphere. The good news: Not only will your body acclimate to the cooler weather, but you can also hurry this process along. Beginning in the 1960s, U.S. Army researchers found that nude men who spent eight hours a day in a 50°F (10°C) chamber became habituated to the cold and had mostly stopped shivering after two weeks. Later research from Scandinavian and U.K. teams likewise concluded that people can get used to cool environments. And a recent research review from Army researchers concluded that all humans seem to have at least some ability to acclimatize to the cold. A small 2014 study published in the journal PLOS One, a group of healthy men spent up to three hours a day sitting in baths filled with 57°F (about 14°C) water. (That’s roughly the temperature of the Atlantic Ocean along the New Jersey and New York coastlines in late October, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.) At the start of the 20-day study, the men did a lot of shivering, which is the human body’s initial response to cold. Their heart rates and metabolisms sped up, generating heat. At the same time, their blood vessels narrowed and drew back from the surface of the skin, causing skin temperature to drop. Basically, the men’s vascular systems clenched—pulling blood toward their warmer interiors in an effort to escape the exterior cold. But by Day 20, much had...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized HealthSummit19 Research Source Type: news