Abstract |
Although several reviews of thermal influences on performance have appeared during the past decade, none have succeeded in synthesizing the various experimental results. In the meantime, new evidence has been presented from several studies, particularly those in classroom situations. The present report takes a critical look at this recent work, and hypothesizing that to the human the degree of warmth is merely relative to its subjective perception, attempts to find common basis for comparison of levels of performance by different populations in greatly differing thermal environments. When viewed from the basis of levels of thermal comfort, the seemingly chaotic information that is available can be drawn into some focus, and many of the apparent contradictions and erroneous interpretations tend to become considerably diminished. |