Why do women often see cold office temperatures, and men normal?

Inside the large room, there was no "chill". This is especially true when summer comes, the time when air conditioners begin to operate is when women replace office closet with light jackets, long skirts and high heels.

In fact, dozens of reasons why office buildings are modeled after the ice cave of Hoth (in Star Wars). One problem that scientists have argued is that setting up a thermostat in the office is still affected by what people have been studying since the 1960s, and the number in research is only for factions. strong.

The truth is a bit more complicated, but especially true for office buildings deemed "frozen" that many employees feel uncomfortable, according to Stefano Schiavon, Associate Professor of Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley.

So where is the right place for us? What can we do to exercise our body "tolerance" with the cold? What can make the working environment more comfortable?

In fact, changing our body's response to cold is not easy, although it can sometimes be done. There are many other ways to make the office more comfortable for everyone, even finding the right balance can be beneficial for health.

Not all offices have the same standard of temperature.

Of course, I know my office is too cold

Not all offices have the same standard of temperature. However, women tend to feel the cold faster than men and seem particularly difficult to adapt to the conditions of winter work despite in pleasant weather.

That's partly because the average female body has a bit more fat . John Castellani, a physiologist at the US Army Institute for Environmental Medicine at Natick, Massachusetts, said : " Fat is an excellent insulator and therefore, skin temperature in real women. Health may be slightly lower than men . "

According to Wouter van Marken Lichtenbelt, a physiologist at Maastricht University Medical Center in the Netherlands, lower metabolism in women is also a reason. In 2015, Lichtenbelt reported that women in office work had lower metabolic rates than those in the study group to provide the necessary conditions to help people feel comfortable in the room . " Climatic climate standards at a particular time can distort the heat needs of women and the elderly, " according to a study in Nature Climate Change. They also note that women can be comfortable with average room temperature at 25 degrees Celsius, while men are about 22 degrees Celsius.

Of course, research is conducted on a small number of people and women and this is just a generalization. There are many variables that affect the body's response to the cold such as physiology, height, weight, weight, clothing and type of activity, Schiavon said.

According to engineer Bjarne Olesen, in fact, the climate standards in the room are established by ASHRAE Association of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers taking into account women. The metabolic rate among individuals has a greater difference between the sexes.

However, both Lichtenbelt and Olesen may agree that office buildings are too cold. ASHRAE standards suggest that room temperature in the summer should be between 23-26 degrees Celsius. But 2009 office building survey results show that room temperatures are often below this limit and are actually colder. Turn on the temperature for winter.

Lichtenbelt said: "This means that people of any gender are at risk of being cold, especially in the summer. Today's office usually has a temperature of about 20-22 degrees Celsius."

Air conditioning is a device often blamed for making the office too cold, Schiavon said. Air conditioning systems are often overloaded and must balance between temperature and air humidity. Whatever the reason, we are still maintaining the temperature that employees are not really comfortable with.

How to face?

The light in the room can affect comfort from inside the body.

You can fool yourself into feeling warm. British researchers found light in the room could affect comfort from inside the body. The person sitting in the room under the golden light will feel warmer than those sitting in the bathroom under blue light, even when the temperature is low.

Castellani for knowledge . "There are also ways to make our bodies adapt to the cold. The most common way is to name the habit and you can experience each season."

Castellani added that, in the summer, your body changes slightly physiologically to cope with the heat, making you sweat more easily. At the same time, in the winter, the body will concentrate blood to external contact parts like the face and hands to keep your skin warm. Your body takes a few days to adjust accordingly in the spring or fall and that also affects the perception of the cold.

"Similarly, if you work in cold conditions, over time you will also feel a little more comfortable. When you are constantly exposed to the cold, you get used to it, of course, there are many limitations. For many people, especially women, the temperature in office buildings is lower than the body limits they may feel comfortable with , ' Lichtenbelt said.

According to Castellani, there are many ways to make your body tolerant to the cold, but you need to endure a cold chill. People who spend a lot of time outdoors and don't wear a lot of thick clothing, including indigenous Australians, can withstand large drops of water falling on their skin and regulate their body temperature without shaking. The explanation for this phenomenon is that shaking for a long time will consume a lot of energy. By walking under low temperature and still working, your metabolism will be much lower.

Military researchers can offer adaptation in the lab by asking many men to sit in cold water for 90 minutes a day, 5 days a week for 5 weeks without wearing anything other than swim trunks."We often don't tell them this is what they want to do. Partly because the practice is arduous and partly because the changes can bring vague results. In other words: the body You can preserve heat better, but you are still constantly fighting the cold . "

Athlete Wim Hof, who climbed Mount Kilimanjaro while wearing his lap and ran ½ the race at the North Pole with bare feet, set up a training regime that could help him withstand the harsh conditions, thanks to a combination of meditate, practice breathing and touch ice. This technique can help Hof block the cold thanks to the brain releasing cannabinoid compounds (found in hemp and marijuana) and opioid groups (often in painkillers). The final pain reaction leads to "reduced sensitivity to cold and increased sense of partiality and health", according to the NeuroImage magazine.

Ice is not what I need

There is a much simpler way to help office buildings become comfortable with many people working inside: reducing the number of air conditioners.

Some places start to feel comfortable wearing, especially for men, can make employees feel better. In Japan, the government launched a campaign called Cool Biz every summer, encouraging businesses to increase room temperature and allow employees to wear short-sleeved shirts instead of tie suits.

Meanwhile, Schiavon argued that installing fans in the office would save energy and help employees feel satisfied. Instead of using air conditioning during the summer, offices run fans until the temperature exceeds the specified level, the air conditioner will be turned on. Fans save more energy and are cheaper than air conditioners.

"Of course, people have different warmth ranges. No one temperature satisfies all. We are different and we need to have a more personalized environment , " Schiavon said.

Ideally, he said, each employee should have their own desk fan , allowing them to control the temperature in the neighborhood. In the winter, people can keep their workspace warm by using heated seats or electric mats under their feet.

There are many offices, each staff has its own fan. That's why Schiavon is studying smart fans for common spaces. Anyone in the office can give feedback by sending a command saying they are hot or cold and the fan system will take that into account when "deciding" the shared fan speed. Air conditioning systems often do not have this feature, Schiavon said.

Great! But my office has no intention of installing those special fans

Do not despair. It is also beneficial to endure sitting in an uncomfortable office in the summer. Scientists really think that cold tolerance brings health benefits.

When cold, our bodies start using brown fat. Other white fat used to store energy, brown fat burns calories and releases heat. Babies use brown fat to keep warm, but this characteristic disappears when we grow up. In 2009, scientists, including Lichtenbelt, found adults could retain some brown fat. Researchers try to figure out how to "consume" it in hopes of helping us lose weight.

Lichtenbelt reports that if our surroundings are outside the comfort zone, our metabolism will increase and the cardiovascular system will be trained. Basically, the body must consume more energy to maintain the temperature in warm or cool places. In cold conditions, brown fat works, though, more research is needed before we know how much brown fat is beneficial for health, Lichtenbelt said.

Also according to Lichtenbelt, we can still "benefit" from the cold without the freezing offices. You don't need to suffer. In fact, the best way is to change the temperature in office buildings throughout the day. This will allow us to benefit from both warm and cool conditions.

"And office workers are not the only ones to benefit, he said. After retirement, the elderly often spend a lot of time in the room, where the temperature is not much different. This can really make Their body is less elastic, because the environment in the room is too stable, you become fragile again , " Lichtenbelt added.

Lichtenbelt began to study the temperature range will be most beneficial for employees and the elderly."This depends on the local climate. It is difficult to give general guidelines, especially countries with many different climates."

In general, it will take a while before we realize the most efficient and energy-efficient temperature for office buildings.