Goose bumps and Trembling: So the cold affects the body

The fingers are clammy, limb pain, trembling of the body: Cold is uncomfortable, but in the cold the protection of the organism.

But what happens actually? And women will actually be faster to cold than men?

Why freeze it?

In the skin, receptors that are constantly measuring how hot or cold it is. The body has a temperature of around 37 degrees Celsius, and he wants to keep.

If the outside temperature falls below about 15 degrees, and uses a protection mechanism, explains Herbert Löllgen, honorary President of the German society for sports medicine and prevention (DGSP).

The blood vessels of the skin constrict to prevent too much heat is lost. The blood flow is redistributed to the vital organs and, thus, the middle of the body.

You can feel it especially on the hands, feet, ears, or lips.

Why do you get goose bumps and shiver when it is cold?

Both are counter-reactions to cold. The Trembling of the muscles of the body tenses again and again. By this movement, heat is created.

Goose bumps you get, because the body hair, small muscles sit. “So this is a Mini-tension of these small hairs, the also have a small muscle, what you can’t see,” says Löllgen.

Is it true that women freeze faster than men?

Women is actually white cold faster than men for several reasons, such as a pharmacist, Heidi Guenther of the Barmer health insurance Fund.

Men have a higher muscle proportion in the body. The muscles produce heat, and ensure that a not-so-fast cold.

Women also have thinner skin than men. The thickness of the skin determines how much heat the body can store.

Thin people freeze faster than fat people?

Yes. One reason is the difference in the proportion of fat in the layer directly under the skin. “The fat tissue has a certain insulating layer,” says Löllgen.

Fat acts almost like a winter jacket that warms you from the inside out. The benefit of thick people, especially on uncovered parts of the body.

Since the body loses, according to Löllgen namely, the most heat – and thin people, this inner jacket is missing.

In the summer, the thick people can be, but to the detriment. Then you sweat faster than Thin.

Alcohol helps against the cold?

No, mulled wine and co. cool the body even. While alcohol expands the blood vessels in the skin and thus promotes blood circulation. But this is only in the short term, hot.

Because the resulting heat is rapidly emitted from the skin to the air. The Federal centre for health education (BZgA) expects that the alcohol lowers in about half a bottle of wine, the body temperature by half a degree.

You are advised to drink prefer hot tea. Especially ginger tea is recommended: The sharp substances of ginger for better circulation to the internal organs and provides heat in the Interior of the body.

Sources

• Günther, H. (2017): Why not freeze women faster than men?, archived from the original on 03.01.2020: https://www.barmer.de/presse/infothek/newsletter-gesundheit-im-blick/presse-newsletter-archiv/archiv-2017/frieren-78392
• Federal centre for health education (2019): Warms the alcohol really from the inside?, archived from the original on 03.01.2020: https://www.kenn-dein-limit.de/aktuelles/artikel/waermt-alkohol-wirklich-von-innen/

Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa)

*The contribution of “goose bumps and Shaking from the cold acts on the body” is published by FitForFun. Contact with the executives here.