Assessment of wellbeing in an indoor office environment

Relationships between indoor building conditions and wellbeing of occupants are complex; many indoor stressors can exert their effects additively or through complex interactions. It has been shown that exposure to these stressors can cause both short-term and long-term effects. Relevant relations between measurements of chemical and physical indoor environmental parameters and effects have been difficult to make. To increase the chance on successful assessment of cause-effect relationships in future indoor environmental quality (IEQ) investigations, there seems to be a need to improve procedures applied to gather the relevant information. From different fields of expertise knowledge was retrieved on how and why people respond to external stressors, which factors, parameters or indicators can be used to explain these responses and how to assess those. No consensus exists on which physical, physiological, psychological or social indicators should be applied to explain these responses. However, several existing techniques are available and promising innovative techniques are being developed, of which the applicability needs to be explored. The review results in a better overview of which factors are important to consider in future studies.

► There is a need to improve IEQ assessment procedures. ► Knowledge from different fields of expertise was gathered. ► All stressors and factors could be relevant to include in future studies. ► It is important to be open to knowledge from health and building sciences.