From the creators of ‘Blue Monday’, the saddest day of the year, now comes the happiest ‘Yellow Day’. And it’s not the best; It’s not even all the happiness, optimism, fun and vitality we need to feel on a day like today. The best thing is that a marketing campaign for an ice cream brand from 15 years ago continues to seep into TV, radio, and newspapers without us showing the slightest skepticism. It’s time to say that ‘Yellow Day’ is a hoax and moreover a dangerous hoax.

A gentleman named Cliff Arnall. In 2005, travel agency Sky Travel issued a press release stating that a team of scientists from Cardiff University discovered that the third Monday in January was the worst day of the year. This was the origin of ‘Blue Monday’, a marketing campaign. First of all, because the “Cardiff University team of scientists” was one man: Cliff Arnall.

Cliff Arnall was a teacher at the Center for Lifelong Learning; A centre, effectively affiliated with Cardiff University, but dedicated to organizing additional courses, specialist degrees and continuing education. Strictly speaking, he was not a university researcher, and the success of ‘Blue Monday’ (added to the fact that it was methodologically ridiculous) resulted in expelling him from the University.

So six months later and he was back at war with ‘Yellow Day’ in the hands of Helados Wall (the British Unilever brand equivalent to Frigo). With this background, one can already fear the worst; but let’s give it a try. Does it make sense to talk about the happiest day of the year?

Formula. As in the case of ‘Blue Monday’ (and as part of a commercial strategy to sell all this as a scientific question), Arnall has published a formula for calculating the day in question. this, O+(NxS)+Cpm/T+Heand its explanation is simpler than the formulation intended to imply.

• It means ‘outside’: it refers to when we spend more time outside and enjoy outdoor activities.

• N is for ‘nature’: for the supposed connection we have with the environment these days.

• S is for ‘to socialize’: because it’s time to meet up with friends and family.

• ‘CPM’ is taken from ‘children’s positive memories’: that is, childhood memories of the same season.

• T is for ‘temperature’: because it gets hotter with the coming of summer.

• It is for ‘holidays’: because the imminence of the holidays.

The first conclusion, of course, is that ‘Yellow Day’ is only June 20 in the northern hemisphere, but that’s just a detail. The question goes even further: The sooner we examine it, the more we realize that this day series has no scientific basis whatsoever. What Dean Burnett said about his blue brother in 2012 applies perfectly to him:[es] unscientific. pseudo scientist. Uber pseudo-scientist. Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit, bullshit, and any polite way you can think of to say ‘stupid’.”

And it’s not because these things haven’t been researched. While we haven’t actually made serious attempts to pinpoint the happiest or saddest day of the year, there is quite a bit of research into how days of the week affect people’s moods. But Arnall ignores all this and doesn’t even pretend to approach anything beyond an outward patina, something remotely resembling scientific research. ‘Yellow Day’ is what it claims to be, and little more: a campaign to sell ice cream.

An unlucky campaign. The problem is that unlike ‘Blue Monday’, which may have a role in the ‘normalization of sadness’ typical of everyday life, ‘Yellow Day’ rains on wet ground. In recent years, books and materials have not refrained from opposing the obligation to be happy. In fact, before the pandemic, headline inflation was pretty high (perhaps too much).

However, they are partially right. Clinical evidence supports that the interpretations we give (often culturally shaped) to our behavior play an important role in the development and maintenance of psychological disorders. Diving into the idea that happiness is a “decision” only deepens the schemas that support mood disorders.

justify sadness. And at this point, we realize that it’s not just about challenging depressive overdiagnosis and improving our ways of coping with mood disorders, it’s also about accepting sadness as normal; fighting against this “must be happy”. After all, sadness has an evolutionary function that supports updating our cognitive structures and allowing us to adapt to drastic changes in our environment, eliminating it would be a mistake. “I will, if you allow me to let the wounds heal and my expression that leaves an imprint on a personal and societal level, no matter how many painkillers we take.”

Image | Lydia NOTHING