ABSTRACT
Large amounts of money are invested in the creation and running of the built environment. Turning to the area of complexity, the design factors that might be influential, the field of internal environment quality (IEQ) takes a 'scientific' approach that should be consonant with the desire for hard metrics. IEQ research has primarily focused on the 'big four' readily measurable aspects of: heat, light, sound and air quality, and although impressive individual sense impacts have been identified, it has been a struggle to explain variations in overall human performance with these variables. Unlike for schools, in offices there is not a relatively simple, individual measure of occupant performance. There are in fact many possible performance measures with a focus mainly on individual and collective productivity, sometimes on creativity and to a reasonable extent on well-being. The Holistic Evidence and Design project on schools also indicates the scale and nature of the cognitive impacts of the holistic physical environment.
