According to a new study analysis in Building Research & Information, adjusting your thermostat a few degrees in both directions can boost your metabolism and potentially help fight obesity and diabetes. Hmmm, we may need to rethink this whole idea of hating how hot and humid it can get outside. The research says, that exposing yourself to lower temperatures (think 64 to 68 degrees Fahrenheit) and higher (think 90 degrees Fahrenheit) can help your nervous system to regulate your body’s core temperature better. Right now since most of us are in some of the hotter temperatures of the summer, we tend to hang out in air conditioning that sits around 72 degrees. If you can just work the temperatures to slightly above or below what your body is used to being in, that is where they are suggesting you adjust the temps from to change your body’s core temperature.

Men’s Fitness

“Our bodies are designed to maintain a constant state of equilibrium, known as homeostasis,” explains Paul Arciero, Ph.D., director of the Human Nutrition & Metabolism Laboratory at Skidmore College in New York.

Once your body reaches homeostasis there really isn’t a lot of work it has to do. It just lets your body do its thing without any effort really. Disruption is what your body needs. Disrupting this equilibrium causes your body to rev up or rev down which causes your metabolism to activate to keep your body cooled down or warmed up!

Arciero says temperature fluctuations can help fit folks burn more calories, too.

In conclusion, it is summer, it is hot, you are in the A/C. If this is you, then on your lunch breaks take a walk outside in the dreaded heat. If you have access to a sauna sit in that. Take a super hot shower. Turn the heat on in your car. I know these ideas do sound kinda miserable but you may be doing your metabolism a favor!