Study Links Office Temperature To Keyboarding Performance

If your office is too cold you might not be typing as accurately — or as much — as you could be, according to a study evaluating the influence of indoor environmental conditions on worker productivity. Conducted by Alan Hedge, director of Cornell University’s Human Factors and Ergonomics Laboratory, the study found a 74-percent increase in typing mistakes and a 46-percent reduction in typing output when office temperatures fell from 77°F to 68°F. The findings were presented at the 2004 Eastern Ergonomics Conference in New York.

The study investigated the link between changes in physical environmental conditions and changes in work performance. During the study, which was conducted at Insurance Office of America’s headquarters in Orlando, FL, nine workstations were equipped with a miniature personal environment sensor for sampling air temperature every 15 minutes for a full working month. Researchers recorded the amount of time that employees typed and the amount of time they spent making corrections.

“At 77°F, employees were keying 100-percent of the time with a 10-percent error rate, while at 68°F, keying went down to 54-percent of the time with a 25-percent error rate,” says Hedge. “Temperature is a key variable that can impact performance.” An abbreviated version of Hedge’s study is available at http://ergo.human.cornell.edu.

A study found a 74-percent increase in typing mistakes and a 46-percent reduction in typing output when office temperatures fell from 77°F to 68°F.

Source: Professional Safety; Jan, 2005