The Effect of Time of Day and Time of Year on Thermal Comfort
Abstract
In order to determine if affective responses to cool, neutral, and warm temperatures were related to the season of the year and the time of day, 108 subjects were exposed in groups of six (3 males and 3 females) for 3 hours to three temperatures 20.0°C, 25.6°C and 31.7°C at 50%rh during the morning (0900–1200) afternoon (1300–1600) and evening (1800–2100) in the summer and winter. The subjects were sedentary and wore similar clothing; a 9 category Thermal Sensation ballot and a 7-pair semantic differential scale for measuring Thermal Comfort were administered every half hour during the three hour exposure. An analysis of variance showed that the main effects, Time of Day, Sex and Season were not significant and only Temperature and Voting were significant; both measures showed significant Season x Temperature interactions. Basically, the 20.0°C environment was judged to be more comfortable in the summer than in the winter and the 31.7°C environment was judged to be more comfortable in the winter than in the summer. The seasonal findings are opposite to those found in recent research and suggest that different temperature criteria for thermal comfort should be considered for summer and winter conditions.
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The assumption in thermal comfort prescriptions is primarily based on thermal comfort studies conducted in the 1970s and 1980s.
“This assumption is primarily based on thermal comfort studies conducted in the 1970s and 1980s [12–17].”
From Human thermal perception and time of day: A review (2021) · cites this paper as [16]
Among the 15 reviewed experimental studies investigating diurnal variations in thermal perception, six found no significant differences in thermal perception.
“Among the 15 reviewed experimental studies investigating diurnal variations in thermal perception, six found no significant differences in thermal perception [12–17,78]”
From Human thermal perception and time of day: A review (2021) · cites this paper as [16]
Results from at least four other studies seem to contradict the tendency to prefer higher temperatures in the early evening.
“However, the results from at least four other studies [12–17] seem to contradict these results.”
From Human thermal perception and time of day: A review (2021) · cites this paper as [16]
In Rohles' second series, time of day was not found to affect participants' thermal sensation response.
“Again, the time of day was not found to affect participants’ thermal sensation response.”
From Human thermal perception and time of day: A review (2021) · cites this paper as [16]
Past thermal comfort studies, including some reviewed here, have highlighted that variance in the thermal sensory response is greater in female versus male subjects.
“Past thermal comfort studies, including some of those reviewed here [12–17], already highlighted that variance in the thermal sensory response is greater in female versus male subjects.”
From Human thermal perception and time of day: A review (2021) · cites this paper as [16]
Only three out of the 15 reviewed experimental studies reported the details of the light exposure and only in terms of intensity (lux).
“However, only three out of the 15 reviewed experimental studies reported the details of the light exposure and only in terms of intensity (lux) [12,16,77,78].”
From Human thermal perception and time of day: A review (2021) · cites this paper as [16]
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Are You Comfortable Now: Deep Learning the Temporal Variation in Thermal Comfort in Winters
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- Authors
- Rohles, F. H.
- Affiliations
- Kansas State University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Rohles, Frederick H.
- Venue
- Proceedings of the Human Factors Society Annual Meeting
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 1979-10
- Volume
- 23
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 129-132
- ISSN
- 0163-5182 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W602438514
- Cited by
- 12
- References
- 4
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 1 · 2023: 1 · 2022: 1 · 2021: 2 · 2019: 1 · 2017: 1 · 2013: 1
- FWCI
- 2.22
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Engineering › Building and Construction › Building Energy and Comfort Optimization
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Physiology › Thermoregulation and physiological responses
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Environmental Engineering › Urban Heat Island Mitigation
- Keywords
- thermal comfort, time of day, indoor temperature, thermal sensation, semantic differential, seasonal variation
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