Interactive effects of indoor environmental factors on work performance

Area of Science:

• Environmental Psychology
• Occupational Health
• Human Factors Engineering

Background:

• Operative temperature, relative humidity, and ventilation rate are key environmental factors influencing work performance.
• Understanding the quantitative interactions between these factors is crucial for optimizing workplace environments.
• Previous research often studied these factors in isolation, limiting a comprehensive understanding of their combined effects.

Purpose of the Study:

• To quantitatively analyze the interaction effects of operative temperature, relative humidity, and ventilation rate on neurobehavioral performance.
• To develop a method for calculating the synergistic or antagonistic relationships between multiple environmental factors.
• To provide insights for improving workplace ergonomics and productivity.

Main Methods:

• Recruited 18 participants to perform neurobehavioral ability tests under varied environmental conditions.
• Employed central composite design to systematically vary operative temperature, relative humidity, and ventilation rate.
• Utilized regression fitting and multi-factor coupling analysis, defining an interval coefficient (β) to quantify interaction effects.

Main Results:

• Perception and expression tasks showed antagonistic effects between operative temperature and relative humidity (β = 0.50–0.82), and operative temperature and ventilation rate (β = -0.29 to -0.38).
• A synergistic effect was observed between relative humidity and ventilation rate (β = 1.71–2.28) for perception/expression tasks.
• Reasoning tasks exhibited antagonistic interactions among all three factors and their combinations (β = 0.67–0.83).

Conclusions:

• The study successfully quantified multi-factor interaction effects on cognitive performance, distinguishing between synergistic and antagonistic relationships.
• The proposed method provides a valuable tool for analyzing complex environmental interactions in ergonomics and occupational health research.
• Findings highlight the importance of considering combined environmental factors to optimize work performance and well-being.