Psych 372 Environmental Psychology (12 workspaces)

8/11/2019 Psych 372 Environmental Psychology (12 workspaces)

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Environmental psychology of theworkplacePsychology 372



The Hawthorne effect

• There actually was something to learn here….



An organizing framework

• The physical environment (sound, light, furnishings, etc.)

• The symbolic environment (what is the workspace for?)

• The aesthetic environment (does it look good?)

• The worker (different roles, personalities, levels of experience)

• All of these affect:• Performance

• Feelings

• Health

• Social behaviour



Sound, noise and music

• What is noise?• Sound you don‟t want or like



Noise and productivity

• Task effects• Individual differences

• Sound properties (pattern and predictability)

• Control



Noise and Feelings

• 99% of employees consider noise a negative factor in tworkspace

• Most often, it is singled out as the most irritating part ofworkspace

• There may be a disconnect between feelings and prod

• Eg maybe we just work harder when its quiet



Noise and health

• Depends on the intensity and duration of the noise• 90dB exposure for a few hours can cause a TTS

• Over 100dB exposure can cause a TTS more quickly(depending on intensity)

• Generally, such noise levels are found in industrial settare regulated



Noise and social behaviour

• A double-edged sword in open environments• Too low affects privacy

• Too high affects communication

• One fascinating study suggests that noise influences pdecision-making



Climate in the workspace

• Effective temperature• Temperature, humidity, air movement combined

• Of course must take into account usual clothing and thtask



Climate and productivity

• Most effects at top and bottom of range• Above 30C performance on cog tasks drops

• Below 14C performance on fine manual tasks drops

• Complex dependencies between type of task and optimal(learning is best below 25C, vigilance better above 27C)



Climate and feelings

• Our comfort zones may not match our productive zone• We are easily fooled

• Control is important



Climate and health

• We have remarkable ability to adapt• Atlantic fishers



Climate and social behaviour

• One study showed increased aggression in story compthe lab

• In the field, lots of studies have measured relationship violent crimes and climate – generally positive relations



Air quality in the workplace

• More of a concern now because of emphasis on sustai



Air quality and performance

• The “myth” of negative ions • Does fragrance matter?



Air quality and feelings

• Skimpy evidence for effects• Perception of air quality may matter more than actual q

• The streamer effect



Air quality and health

• Sick building syndrome?• Seems real but the precise cause has been hard to pin do

• Oxygen levels

• The TSE story



Air quality and social behaviour

• We band together against bad odours



Light in the workplace

• The obvious – we have to have enough light to work• Wide variety of indoor lighting systems

• Natural light when possible is the gold standard

• But it‟s rarely possible to have enough of it



Light and productivity

• Task lighting is the most sustainable and efficient• Full spectrum lighting – not strong evidence for an effe



Light and feelings

• There‟s no end of recommendations for influence of cofeelings

• Hard evidence is harder to come by

• Evolutionary “just-so” stories



Schauss or „drunk-tank‟pink



Light and health

• The obvious effects of glare-eyestrain



Light and social behaviour

• Sporadic accounts of effects (eg warm wavelengths encollaboration) but little of substance



Space in the workplace

• Brief history

• The assembly line model

• The action-office

• The open workplace



Assembly line offices



Action office



Cubicle farm



Open plan office



Playground open offices



The non-office



How do these office designs stack up?

• Cubicle farms produce isolation, depersonalization

• But CAN be good for certain kinds of work

• Open offices have been vaulting in popularity but are auniversally disliked

• The Chiat-Day experience

• Lack of privacy, noise



Telecommuting is in flux

• Marissa Meyer and Yahoo

• The power of face to face

• Swarm intelligence and agile decision making

• CMU study showed performance related to group dynamics individual traits

• Turn-taking, social sensitivity, # of women• Performance exceeded prediction from average and max sc

individuals in the group



Distance matters

• The 30 meter rule

• Floor effects



The organizationof space

-main street

-serendipitous encounters



Summary

• Traditional corpus of evidence suggests that basic phyproperties of office have an influence

• Overall office design philosophy can have broad impac

• (and this is really a small part of a company‟s budget)

• Ideas about technology, open offices, telecommuting a

much in flux

Psych 372 Environmental Psychology (12 workspaces)

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