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Brager, G, Zhang, H and Arens, E (2015) Evolving opportunities for providing thermal comfort. Building Research & Information, 43(03), 274-87.

de Dear, R, Kim, J, Candido, C and Deuble, M (2015) Adaptive thermal comfort in Australian school classrooms. Building Research & Information, 43(03), 383-98.

  • Type: Journal Article
  • Keywords:
  • ISBN/ISSN: 0961-3218
  • URL: https://doi.org/10.1080/09613218.2015.991627
  • Abstract:
    This survey of thermal comfort in classrooms aimed to define empirically the preferred temperatures, neutral temperatures and acceptable temperature ranges for Australian school children, and to compare them with findings from adult populations. The survey was conducted in a mixture of air-conditioned, evaporative-cooled and naturally ventilated classrooms in nine schools located in three distinct subtropical climate zones during the summer of 2013. A total of 2850 questionnaires were collected from both primary (grade) and secondary (high) schools. An indoor operative temperature of about 22.5°C was found to be the students' neutral and preferred temperature, which is generally cooler than expected for adults under the same thermal environmental conditions. Despite the lower-than-expected neutrality, the school children demonstrated considerable adaptability to indoor temperature variations, with one thermal sensation unit equating to approximately 4°C operative temperature. Working on the industry-accepted assumption that an acceptable range of indoor operative temperatures corresponds to group mean thermal sensations of -0.85 through to +0.85, the present analysis indicates an acceptable summertime range for Australian students from 19.5 to 26.6°C. The analyses also revealed between-school differences in thermal sensitivity, with students in locations exposed to wider weather variations showing greater thermal adaptability than those in more equable weather districts.

Farnham, C, Emura, K and Mizuno, T (2015) Evaluation of cooling effects: outdoor water mist fan. Building Research & Information, 43(03), 334-45.

Gauthier, S and Shipworth, D (2015) Behavioural responses to cold thermal discomfort. Building Research & Information, 43(03), 355-70.

Hellwig, R T (2015) Perceived control in indoor environments: a conceptual approach. Building Research & Information, 43(03), 302-15.

Mavrogianni, A, Taylor, J, Davies, M, Thoua, C and Kolm-Murray, J (2015) Urban social housing resilience to excess summer heat. Building Research & Information, 43(03), 316-33.

Parkinson, T and de Dear, R (2015) Thermal pleasure in built environments: physiology of alliesthesia. Building Research & Information, 43(03), 288-301.

Teli, D, James, P A B and Jentsch, M F (2015) Investigating the principal adaptive comfort relationships for young children. Building Research & Information, 43(03), 371-82.

Verhaart, J, Veselý, M and Zeiler, W (2015) Personal heating: effectiveness and energy use. Building Research & Information, 43(03), 346-54.