• Journal of the Korean Society for Geothermal and Hydrothermal Energy
• /
• v.11 no.1
• /
• pp.7-14
• /
• 2015

This study has been purposed to provide thermal comfort range in accordance with the residential style of radiant floor heating space, and to compare it with the thermal comfort range at predicted mean vote. The survey for the thermal sensation vote to the subjects and the measurement of environmental factors has been executed, and regression analysis has been performed. It is interpreted that the combination of the physical factor and the psychological factor results lower neutral point of the floor sitting style than that of the chair sitting style. There are some difference between the measured predicted mean vote and the thermal sensation vote via survey, which appears to be caused by distinctive heat transfer characteristic of floor radiant heating space, such as, high radiant temperature and contact thermal sensation of floor surface.

• Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
• /
• v.34 no.2
• /
• pp.151-165
• /
• 2015

Objective: This study aims to develop and scientifically investigate the efficacy of the Spine S-curve Reactive Backrest that responds to the spine curvature of the user when seated, and maintains and enhances the natural S-curve of the lower back, thereby helping to relieve fatigue, correct posture and prevent spine deformities. Background: The focus of current development, design guidelines and/or standards for office chairs is mainly placed on the chair's dimensions, incline angle, adjusting features and lumbar support. Research and development was called for developing a chair backrest that maintains and improves the S-curve of the full spine. Method: The Spine S-curve Reactive Backrest was ergonomically designed to maintain correct posture and enhance user comfort. When leaned on, the backrest responds to the user's spine line and the whole lower back sits closely against the backrest, thereby aligning the user's lower back and backrest as one to maintain and improve the natural S-curve formation of the spine. In order to evaluate the efficacy of the newly designed chair (new design) and the comparison target (chair), five male college students of standard body type with normal spine curvature were selected as test subjects, and a motion analyzer and electromyography were utilized to measure S-curve and erector spinae muscle activity when seated. Results: The spine S-curve was better maintained and improved when sitting in the new design than in the comparison chair. Particularly notable was the greater displacement gap of the thoracic spine than the cervical spine, and also that of the lumbar more than the thoracic spine, with the increase of the backrest tilting angle. Furthermore, the electromyogram results showed the new design caused a lower fatigue level of the erector spinae muscles compared to the comparison chair, and also earned a higher preference in the subjective opinion results. Conclusion: The newly designed chair in this study responds to the user's spine curvature and maintains and enhances the lower back's natural S-curve, and thereby relieves fatigue, promotes better posture, and helps to prevent spine deformities better than existing office chairs. There is a need to widely introduce and supply this new design. Application: The new design is applicable to office and student chairs, and is expected to improve concentration and work efficiency.

• Proceedings of the ESK Conference
• /
• 1995.04a
• /
• pp.124-133
• /
• 1995

A field study was conducted to assess the preferred height and the range of discomfort recognition of school desks and chairs for students from elementary school to high school. For this study 43 male subjects and 44 female subjects in Taejon area were surveyed. The result shows that the preferred height of chairs is about 1.7cm higher than the popliteal sitting height, while the preferred height of desks shows no significant difference with the elbow sitting height which is known to be the ergonomically proper desk height. The threshold value between comfort and discomfort recognition of chair height is 1.88cm below the most prefeered height and 1.79cm about it. The threshold value between comfort and discomfort recognition of desk height is 1.76cm below the most prefeered height and 2.62cm about it.

• Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
• /
• v.14 no.2
• /
• pp.41-50
• /
• 1995

A field study was conducted to assess the preferred height and the range of discomfort recognition of school desks and chairs for students from elementary school to high school. For this study 43 male subjects and 44 female subjects in Taejon metropolitan area were surveyed. The result showed that the preferred height of chairs were found to be about 1.7cm higher than the popliteal sitting height, while the preferred height of desks showed no significant difference with the elbow sitting height which is known to be the ergonomically proper desk height. The threshold value between comfort and discomfort recognition of chair heigth was 1.88cm below the most preferred height and 1.79cm above it. The threshold value between comfort and discomfort recognition of desk height was 1.76cm below the most preferred height and 2.62cm above it.

• Journal of Korean Society of Industrial and Systems Engineering
• /
• v.38 no.3
• /
• pp.14-20
• /
• 2015

It is important to understand psychological and physiological responses of occupants who seated in a chair in order to shape a comfortable indoor official environment. So it is needed to find out optimal seated conditions. The purpose of this study was to explore optimal condition of seat air conditioning control based on psychological or subjective responses (perceived temperature and comfort sensation) and physiological responses (heartrate variability; HRV). To do this, experimental conditions were designed by the difference of indoor temperature and seat air conditioning temperature. In the experiment 1, seven experimental conditions were designed with one control condition which was not used seat air conditioning system, and six experimental conditions which the difference of indoor temperature and seat air conditioning temperature ($-1^{\circ}C{\sim}-6^{\circ}C$). In the experiment 2, four experimental conditions were designed with one control condition and three experimental conditions ($-3^{\circ}C{\sim}-5^{\circ}C$). In addition, participants' psychological or subjective response was measured by CSV (comfort sensation vote) and PTS (perceived temperature sensitivity) as a psychological or subjective response, and heartrate variability was measured as a physiological response. As a result, in the experiment 1, it was reported that the optimal conditions of seat air conditioning control based on participants' psychological or subjective comfort were from $-3^{\circ}C$ to $-5^{\circ}C$ experimental conditions. In addition, in the experiment 2, it was reported that the optimal condition of seat air conditioning control based on participants' physiological comfort was $-4^{\circ}C$ experimental condition. These results suggested that seat air conditioning could affected to comfort sensation of occupants in an appropriate range, rather than unconditionally.

• Proceedings of the Safety Management and Science Conference
• /
• 2003.05a
• /
• pp.143-147
• /
• 2003

This study is to develop a device of bath-seat with massage which is attached to bath-seat and is able to sustain massage on perineal region and anus effectively. And also develop new programmed driving-seat that is able to protect drowsiness. This seat is operated easily by user controlling time period (eg. 30 minutes or 60 minutes) of vibration. During the vibration, user can make a choice of making n sound which is proved as a better effects for concentration and comfort.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
• /
• v.34 no.5
• /
• pp.527-533
• /
• 2010

The feeling that is evoked when products are handled has become increasingly important in the design of products primarily used by humans. In the traditional product design process, prototypes are built several times in order to evaluate the feeling evoked during use. However, these design processes can be optimized by adopting a haptic simulator that can serve as a prototype. The design method based on the use of the haptic simulator is called haptics-aided design (HAD), which is the main subject of this paper. Here, a new HAD method that can be effectively used to design a custom-made chair is proposed. A haptic simulator, which is composed of a haptic chair and an intuitive graphical user interface, was developed. The simulator can adjust the impedance of the backrest and seat pan of a chair in real time. The haptic chair was used instead of real prototypes in order to evaluate the comfort of the initially designed seat pan and backrest on the basis of their stiffness and damping values. It was shown that the HAD method can be effectively used to design a custom-made chair and can be extended to other product design processes.

• Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
• /
• v.33 no.4
• /
• pp.281-287
• /
• 2014

Objective: The objective of the study is to develop a portable assistance device to help elderly users reduce strain on the knee and leg muscle while the elderly are standing up. Background: The pose of standing up from a chair is a basic movement, but the elderly often have difficulty standing up due to their weak muscles. We focus on designing a solution that helps the elderly reduce physical problems and support them standing up. Method: This study consists of three parts. Part I explores the way to reduce the refrain of leg muscle while standing up from a chair. In the process of structural development, we found that the moment is minimized when user pushes down the armrests due to a decrease in the force acting on the center of mass. In part II, a user test of 20 participants was carried out to rank the order of comfort of two stimuli: the chair with fixed armrests and the chair with the four-link mechanism that we created-in three different ways; (1) to stand up without touching armrests, (2) to stand up by pushing down on fixed armrests, and (3) to stand up by pushing down on armrests and being supported by the mechanism. To examine the statistically significant differences among the rank means, a Friedman test was conducted. In part III, we analyze the results of the user test and interview feedbacks, focusing on establishing a design strategy from UPO and visualizing it in 1:1 scale. Results: In part I, we decided to develop the four-link mechanism. The bottom is lifted up as the link rises. In part II, based on the rank data, we empirically found that UPO was assessed as the most comfortable during the stimuli. The thigh angle is smaller and the bottom of UPO is separated from a seat. In part III, after assessing the results and feedbacks, we created a visualization strategy for UPO: light, friendly, and novel. Conclusion: The portable and non-mechanical UPO comprises a four-link system that lifts the user's hips while standing. It can help users avoid knee and leg muscle strain. Its universal design considers the elderly's difficulties. Application: In a future study, combining light and durable material in UPO is expected to increase its usability. And this study is an opportunity to design various types of standing assistance devices.

• Korean Institute of Interior Design Journal
• /
• v.19 no.5
• /
• pp.105-112
• /
• 2010

The purpose of this study is to suggest the color scheme based on the color image types through the color analysis of workstation furniture which is on the market. This color scheme of the workstation furniture is expected to be give the comfort to office environment when planning office. For this study, It is selected the three furniture firms that have a brand of office furniture and their web site that is showed color sample of furniture. The following researches are drawn based upon the purpose. First, the color image types of interior space is classified and the color image words that are suitable for each types is extracted based on the results of existing literature. Second, the distribution of its hue and tone is analysed after collecting the each firm's color sample of desk top, panel and chair. Third, the color image appearing in each furniture color is analysed by color image scale positioning. Forth, the color scheme of desk top, panel and chair is suggested by its color scheme palette. The result of this study is expected to help comfortable environment by providing the color scheme for selection of furniture color in work space. Not all color of each furniture is sufficient to be combined color scheme, the result is indicated that the color scheme of workstation by color image types is possible for color planning in office environment.

• The Journal of Korean Academic Society of Nursing Education
• /
• v.22 no.4
• /
• pp.485-494
• /
• 2016

Purpose: The present research is a descriptive study aimed at understanding clinical nurses' Video display terminal (VDT) syndrome and identifying the factors that affect their VDT syndrome. Methods: Data were collected from 239 clinical nurses working in two metropolitan cities. Research tools included subject's VDT syndrome assessing musculoskeletal, ophthalmic, dermal, psychiatric, and whole body syndromes. The data were analyzed using frequency analysis, average and standard deviation, t-test, One-way ANOVA, and multiple regression analysis with the SPSS/WIN 20.0 program. Results: The subjects' VDT syndrome score was 1.34 out of 5. There were significant differences in participating subjects' VDT syndrome, hospital's size, working unit, health status, diagnosis of illness, having an Order Communication System (OCS), having an Electronic Medical Record (EMR) System, continuous VDT working for more than one hour, break time during VDT use, VDT use time, comfort of the chair, adjustability of the height of the chair, size of the VDT's desk, distance between the monitor and the user's eyes, resolution of the monitor, and frequency of eye exercise during VDT use. According to the research, influencing factors on VDT syndrome in clinical nurses included size of the VDT's desk, frequency of eye exercise during VDT use, having an EMR system, break time during VDT use, diagnosis illness, and having an OCS' system. Conclusion: The findings from this study can be used as a basis for future VDT syndrome prevention education and programs for clinical nurses.