A systematic approach to quantify the influence of indoor environmental parameters on students' perceptions, responses, and short-term academic performance.

Several studies found that classrooms' indoor environmental quality (IEQ) can positively influence in-class activities. Understanding and quantifying the combined effect of four indoor environmental parameters, namely indoor air quality and thermal, acoustic, and lighting conditions on people is essential to create an optimal IEQ. Accordingly, a systematic approach was developed to study the effect of multiple IEQ parameters simultaneously. Methods for measuring the IEQ and students' perceived IEQ, internal responses, and academic performance were derived from literature. Next, this systematic approach was tested in a pilot study during a regular academic course. The perceptions, internal responses, and short-term academic performance of participating students (n = 163) were measured. During the pilot study, the IEQ of the classrooms varied slightly. Significant associations (p < 0.05) were observed between these natural variations and students' perceptions of the thermal environment and indoor air quality. These perceptions were significantly associated with their physiological and cognitive responses (p < 0.05). Furthermore, students' perceived cognitive responses were associated with their short-term academic performance (p < 0.01). The observed associations confirm the construct validity of the systematic approach. However, its validity for investigating the influence of lighting remains to be determined.

What were the historical reasons for the resistance to recognizing airborne transmission during the COVID-19 pandemic?

The question of whether SARS-CoV-2 is mainly transmitted by droplets or aerosols has been highly controversial. We sought to explain this controversy through a historical analysis of transmission research in other diseases. For most of human history, the dominant paradigm was that many diseases were carried by the air, often over long distances and in a phantasmagorical way. This miasmatic paradigm was challenged in the mid to late 19th century with the rise of germ theory, and as diseases such as cholera, puerperal fever, and malaria were found to actually transmit in other ways. Motivated by his views on the importance of contact/droplet infection, and the resistance he encountered from the remaining influence of miasma theory, prominent public health official Charles Chapin in 1910 helped initiate a successful paradigm shift, deeming airborne transmission most unlikely. This new paradigm became dominant. However, the lack of understanding of aerosols led to systematic errors in the interpretation of research evidence on transmission pathways. For the next five decades, airborne transmission was considered of negligible or minor importance for all major respiratory diseases, until a demonstration of airborne transmission of tuberculosis (which had been mistakenly thought to be transmitted by droplets) in 1962. The contact/droplet paradigm remained dominant, and only a few diseases were widely accepted as airborne before COVID-19: those that were clearly transmitted to people not in the same room. The acceleration of interdisciplinary research inspired by the COVID-19 pandemic has shown that airborne transmission is a major mode of transmission for this disease, and is likely to be significant for many respiratory infectious diseases.

Classrooms' indoor environmental conditions affecting the academic achievement of students and teachers in higher education: A systematic literature review.

This study reports the outcomes of a systematic literature review, which aims to determine the influence of four indoor environmental parameters - indoor air, thermal, acoustic, and lighting conditions -on the quality of teaching and learning and on students' academic achievement in schools for higher education, defined as education at a college or university. By applying the Cochrane Collaboration Method, relevant scientific evidence was identified by systematically searching in multiple databases. After the screening process, 21 publications of high relevance and quality were included. The collected evidence showed that the indoor environmental quality (IEQ) can contribute positively to the quality of learning and short-term academic performance of students. However, the influence of all parameters on the quality of teaching and the long-term academic performance could not be determined yet. Students perform at their best in different IEQ conditions, and these conditions are task-dependent, suggesting that classrooms which provide multiple IEQ classroom conditions facilitate different learning tasks optimally. In addition, the presented evidence illuminates how to examine the influence of the IEQ on users. Finally, this information supports decision-makers in facility management and building systems engineering to improve the IEQ, and by doing so, allow teachers and students to perform optimally.