The influence of the lighting environment on performance and well-being in offices

This paper presents an experimental study with 47 participants on the influence of lighting on performance and well-being in an office environment. Well-being, alertness and performance were evaluated and measured in two rooms with artificial lighting and one room with day lighting. The evaluations were correlated to cortisol/melatonin saliva samples, illuminance and spectral compo-sition of the lighting. The results show day lighting to have a sustained influence on alertness and performance and it is furthermore concluded that the level of cortisol in saliva was not influenced by the illuminance and did not have an influence on performance. The participants preferred a lighting with different kinds of light sources to a more neutral lightning and gave it higher ratings for well-being.The analysis shows that comfort did not influence alertness