Thermal comfort as part of a self-regulating system

From studies of the behaviour of children in classrooms and of workers in offices, this article suggests that we should pay more attention to the way people react positively to their thermal environment, by changes of clothing, changes of metabolic rate and modifications to the environment itself. The reactions will be constrained by social pressures, but the whole will tend towards a self-regulating system. Design might therefore concentrate on how to allow for the control mechanisms to operate rather than on trying to establish optimum indoor climates, the authors suggest.