ABSTRACT Chinese adolescents often experience chronic psychological stress from academic pressure. Stress affects thermal comfort, but its effect on adolescents is unclear. This paper investigates this relationship and proposes changes to PMV (Predicted Mean Vote) models to improve predictions of the thermal comfort of adolescents. Surveys and environmental measurements were conducted in winter classrooms in China's Hot Summer and Cold Winter (HSCW) zone. Over 1,300 students aged 10–18 years participated. Main findings: (1) Based on TSV (Thermal Sensation Vote), thermal neutral temperature was 16.7 °C (thermal comfort range was 13.8–19.6 °C); mean clothing insulation was 1.5 clo, higher than ASHRAE's 1.0 clo. (2) PMV overestimated neutral temperature by 1.8 °C, even after correcting for adolescent metabolic rate. (3) Psychological stress raised neutral temperature: 15.9 °C (low stress), 16.7 °C (medium stress), 17.6 °C (high stress). Thermal comfort range narrowed with increasing stress. (4) A new PMV-based model including stress and adolescent metabolic rate better predicted thermal comfort. (5) Neutral temperature increased with age: 16.1 °C (primary), 16.8 °C (junior high), 18.2 °C (senior high). Based on lower comfort limits, heating design temperatures for primary, junior high, and senior high classrooms are 13.4 °C, 15.2 °C, and 15.0 °C. (6) Middle adolescents (13–15 years) were most temperature-sensitive; females felt colder, with a neutral temperature 0.7 °C higher than males. This study provides evidence for the selection of suitable heating temperatures for the design and operation of classrooms for adolescents during cold seasons.
Zhou et al. (Mon,) studied this question.