How climate change and human psychology make this cold snap feel so harsh

The frigid weather gripping much of America is not unprecedented, but it feels that way

The brutally frigid weather that has gripped most of America for the past 11 days is not unprecedented. It just feels that way.

The first quarter of the 21st century was unusually warm by historical standards – mostly due to human-induced climate change – and so a prolonged cold spell this winter is unfamiliar to many people, especially younger Americans.

Because bone-shattering cold occurs less frequently, Americans are experiencing it more intensely now than they did in the past, several experts in weather and behavior said. But the longer the current icy blast lasts – sub-freezing temperatures are forecast to stick around in many places — the easier it should become to tolerate.

“We adapt, we get used to things. This is why your first bite of dessert is much more satisfying than your 20th bite,” Hannah Perfecto, who studies consumer behavior at Washington University in St. Louis, wrote in an email. “The same is true for unpleasant experiences: Day 1 of a cold snap is much more a shock to the system than Day 20 is.”

‘Out of practice’ because of recent mild winters

Charlie Steele, a 78-year-old retired federal worker in Saugerties, New York, considers himself a lover of cold weather. In the recent past, he has gone outside in winter wearing a T-shirt and shorts, and has even walked barefoot in the snow. But this January's deep-freeze is “much, much colder than anything I can remember," he said.

Steele's sense of change is backed up data.

There have been four fewer days of subfreezing temperatures in the U.S. per year, on average, between 2001 and 2025 than there were in the previous 25 years, according to data from Climate Central. The data from more than 240 weather stations also found that spells of subfreezing temperatures have become less widespread geographically and haven’t lasted as long — until this year.

In Albany, about 40 miles (64 kilometers) from Steele, the change has been more pronounced than the national average, with 11 fewer subfreezing days in the last 25 years than the previous quarter century.

“You're out of practice,” Steele said. “You're kind of lulled into complacency.”

Coldest week someone under 30 may have felt

Climate change has shifted what people are used to, said several climate scientists, including Daniel Swain of the University of California's Water Resources Institute.

“It’s quite possible that for anybody under the age of 30, in some spots this may well be the coldest week of their life,” Swain said.

Jennifer Francis, a climate scientist at the Woodwell Climate Research Center in Falmouth, Massachusetts, said, “humans get used to all kinds of things -- city noise, stifling heat, lies from politicians, and winter cold. So when a ‘normal’ cold spell does come along, we feel it more acutely.”

We forget how cold it used to be

People forget how extreme cold feels after just two to eight years of milder winters, according to a 2019 study in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Americans have gone through a much longer stretch than that.

Over the past 30 years, the average daily low in the continental U.S. has dropped below 10 degrees (minus 12 degrees Celsius) 40 times, according to meteorologist Ryan Maue, former chief scientist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. But in the preceding 30 years, that chilly threshold was reached 124 times.

“People have forgotten just how cold it was in the 20th century,” Texas A&M University climate scientist Andrew Dessler said.

Their wake-up call came late last month, when the country's average daily low dipped below 10 degrees three times in one week.

Regardless of how it feels, extremely cold weather presents dangers. People and vehicles slip on ice, power can go down, leaving people freezing in homes, and storms limit visibility, making commuting to work or even doing basic errands, potentially perilous. More than 110 deaths have been connected to the winter storms and freezing temperatures since January.

Shaking off our cold ‘rustiness’

As this winter's frigid days stretch on, people adapt. University of San Diego psychiatrist Thomas Rutledge said people shake off what he calls their “weather rustiness.”

Rutledge explained what he meant via email, recalling the period decades ago when he lived in Alaska. “I assumed that everyone was a good driver in winter conditions. How couldn’t they be with so much practice?" he wrote. "But what I annually observed was that there was always a large spike in car accidents in Alaska after (the) first big snowfall hit. Rather than persistent skills, it seemed that the 4-6 months of spring and summer was enough for peoples’ winter driving skills to rust enough to cause accidents.”

That's Alaska. This cold snap hit southern cities such as Dallas and Miami, where it's not just the people unaccustomed to the cold. Utilities and other basic infrastructure are also ill-equipped to handle the extreme weather, said Francis of the Woodwell Climate Research Center.

While this ongoing cold snap may feel unusually long to many Americans, it isn't, according to data from 400 weather stations across the continental U.S. with at least a century of record-keeping, as tracked by the Southeast Regional Climate Center.

Only 33 of these weather stations have recorded enough subzero temperatures (minus 18 degrees Celsius) since the start of 2026 to be in the top 10% of the coldest first 32 days of any year over the past century.

When Steele moved to the Hudson Valley as a toddler in 1949, the average daily low temperature over the previous 10 winters was 14.6 degrees (minus 9.7 degrees Celsius). In the past 10 years, the average daily low was 20.8 degrees (minus 6.2 degrees Celsius).

As a younger man, Steele used to hunt in winter and sit for hours on cold rocks.

“I could never do that now,” he said. “I’m rusty. I’m out of practice.”

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