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By Dr. Artour Rakhimov, Buteyko breathing teacher and educator

Breathing education; Part 11. Life style factors that matter
(Why do we breathe too heavily?)
G. Can overheating make us breathe more?
“It is noticed that increased temperature or overheating
increases breathing not only in dogs, but in humans too.
This is particularly noticeable in children.”
Dr. Buteyko KP, Public lecture in the Moscow State University, 1972.
Overheating, according to Doctor Buteyko, is another factor that intensifies breathing. That especially relates to many children, who suffer from the belief by loving parents and care-takers, that excessively warm dressing is healthy. A child's metabolism is 2-3 times higher than that of adults. Hence, their bodies normally generate much more energy. Accordingly, healthy children need much less clothing (Buteyko, 1977). Even when children wear minimum clothing, one may see that their hands and feet are usually warm. Only when their hands and feet are cold, adding more clothes or other actions are necessary.
Similar considerations can be applied to adults. During summer, most people wear shirts, t-shirts, dresses and other very light clothes, while going anywhere, outdoors and indoors. Here it would be useful to spend less time in hot and warm places. When it gets colder, people start to wear pullovers, sweaters, jumpers, jackets, coats, suits, etc. However, they wear these heavy clothes even when they are indoors where the temperatures are high. You can see that phenomenon in libraries and offices, shops and waiting rooms, cars and public transport.
Investigations on the influence of heat on breathing found that changes in air wet-bulb temperature, from 17 to 40 degrees, caused a fall in carbon dioxide pressure from 44 to 33 mmHg for healthy male subjects (Gaudio & Neil, 1968). After some math, it follows, that their BHTs fell from 46 to 8 s due to the effects of the strong heat. Thus, if the assumption of linear influence of temperature on ventilation is accepted (although that may not be true for the whole range of values), one may conclude that each two degrees of increased surrounding temperature produce over 1 mmHg of carbon dioxide down (or minus about 2s BHT).
Rapid changes in temperature can increase breathing as well. Sudden cold immersion usually produces severe hyperventilation during the first few breaths. This topic will be discussed in more detail later.

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