Short-term analysis of residential lighting: A pilot study

Abstract

Lighting is one of the environmental elements that facilitates people to maintain their lives. With light people can collect visual cues about their environments in which they can perform visual tasks safely and comfortably. Exploring the lighting systems and conditions in residential interiors is important for introducing new concepts concerning human visual comfort. The study aimed to collect data and conduct a short-term analysis about residential lighting which will be a part of a more comprehensive research. The study focused on day- and artificial lighting systems, conditions and people’s assessments in interiors of residential buildings. An internet-based survey was distributed in July-August 2020 through Google Survey across Poland, Turkey, the U.K. and Sweden in the native languages of each country. 29 adult females and 31 adult males voluntarily participated in the present study. The study identified several interconnected factors related to residential lighting and explored them in detail. Large percentage of the respondents were satisfied or very satisfied with daylighting quality in summer (86.7%) and artificial lighting quality (78.4%) in their living areas. The amount and uniformity of lighting were the most effective cues connected with the respondents’ satisfaction. Reasonable and promising outcomes that were found can be used in generating new and comprehensive data about lighting quality in residential buildings.