A Meta-Synthesis Review of Occupant Comfort Assessment in Buildings (2002–2022)

Abstract

Occupant comfort in buildings is one of the most crucial considerations in designing a building. Accordingly, there is a growing interest in this area. Aspects of comfort include thermal comfort, visual comfort, acoustic comfort, and indoor air quality (IAQ) satisfaction. The objective of this state-of-the-art review was to provide a comprehensive, explicit, and up-to-date literature review on occupant comfort in buildings, since this issue has a great impact on the lifestyle, health, and productivity of occupants. A meta-synthesis method was also used for an analytical-interpretive review of previous studies. In this research, scientific research studies related to the subject of indoor occupant comfort in the period 2002–2022 were reviewed. Previous reviews have often covered the fundamental concepts and principles related to indoor occupant comfort. Although innumerable studies have focused on thermal comfort, other aspects of occupant comfort have not been considered. The review is analyzed and discussed in reference to type of study, case study geographical locations and climate zones, case study building types, decision-making models, assessment criteria, data-collection tools, and data analysis strategies. Finally, future research recommendations are presented. Through the review, we find that the comfort models used in research are mostly based on comfort perception votes collected from experimental studies, which may not reflect the preferences of users well. In addition, only the influence of environmental factors on the models has been investigated, and other personal factors have been ignored. This study presents a useful guide for researchers to determine their outlines for future research in this field.