A field study of office thermal comfort using questionnaire software.

Custom software to automatically administer questionnaires on computer screens was installed on computers in four open-plan offices. Five questions related to thermal comfort were presented twice per day for three months. Results indicate that this new method of subjective data collection was successful and efficient: the participants had few complaints about the method of questionnaire delivery, and a substantial literature review demonstrates that our results are comparable with results from other field studies of thermal comfort conducted using different methods. Participants responded to the questionnaire 29% of the occasions on which it could have been presented and took an average of 45 seconds to answer the five questions. Overall the number of thermal sensation votes indicating thermal acceptability were as predicted by the ANSIIASHRAE Standard and by the comfort theory on which this standard was based. However, our results indicate a greater sensitivity to temperatures away from the neutral temperature than theory predicts. Only 11 % of the variance in thermal sensation vote was explained by indoor air temperature. Approximately 15% of the people modified their clothing in the hour prior to the appearance of the questionnaire, suggesting that clothing modification may be an important mechanism for achieving thermal comfort.