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Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Department of Architecture, Urbanism & Planning, Kasteelpark Arenberg 1/2431, 3001 Leuven, Belgium
Delft University of Technology, Department of Industrial Design, Landbergstraat 15, 2628 CE Delft, The Netherlands
c
Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Department of Architectural Engineering, Pleinlaan 2, 1050 Brussel, Belgium
b
a r t i c l e i n f o
a b s t r a c t
Article history:
Received 8 April 2011
Received in revised form
11 August 2011
Accepted 12 August 2011
Experiential aspects of materials are addressed rather intuitively by architects during the material
selection process for buildings. This paper explores the possibilities of relating material experience in
architecture to technical material parameters and uses the perceived warmth of indoor wall materials as
a case study. Various building materials were assessed technically and their perceived warmth was
evaluated by participants. As people experience a building and its materials through multiple senses, the
separate effects of vision and touch were considered.
Results show that the senses used for evaluation have a major impact on the perception of warmth,
and that a distinction should be made between the visual warmth and tactile warmth of a material. The
overall perception of warmth was shown to correspond to its visual perception. Furthermore, the
perception of material warmth was correlated with several technical material parameters, such as the
thermal effusivity, the surface gloss and the hue and saturation of the material color. The color study
suggested that the material color has a larger effect on the perceived warmth than other material
parameters. An indication of the relationships between the perceived material warmth and measurable
technical material parameters offers architects insights on how to change the experience of warmth by
changing specic technical parameters and thus allows to select materials in a better informed way.
2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords:
Architecture
Building materials
Material experience
Material information
Perception
Warmth
1. Introduction
When choosing materials for a building, architects consider
aspects relating to structural performance, functional requirements
and experience [1,2]. While it seems evident that architects
consider experiences while selecting materials, the importance of
non-technical material considerations started to gain interest only
recently [3e5]. Research shows that experiential considerations are
important in architects material selection process [6,7], but they
are addressed rather intuitively and architects have trouble to
identify or name them [8]. This intuitive approach may work for
familiar materials, where the perceived qualities can be judged
based on previous experience. However, for new and unknown
materials few such references exists. The present research explores
whether aspects of material experience can be described and
related to the materials technical parameters. Making such links
improves our understanding of material experience and may
inform architects while selecting materials.
* Corresponding author. Tel.: 32 16 32 13 34; fax: 32 16 32 19 84.
E-mail address: wastiels@post.harvard.edu (L. Wastiels).
0360-1323/$ e see front matter 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.buildenv.2011.08.009
360
used simultaneously and thus may inuence the overall perception. However, it remains to be established empirically to what
extent each sensory modality contributes to the overall experience
of warmth. Experimental studies in other domains than architecture have shown that the contributions of the sensory modalities
are product-dependent. For instance, smell completely dominates
the experienced freshness for soft drinks and for dishwashing
liquids, but not for scented candles where smell and color seem to
have equal impact [30]. Therefore, we wonder to what extent the
overall perception of warmth for indoor wall coverings is dependent on what people see and what they experience tactually.
Second, also personal associations or memory might inuence the
feeling of warmth that a material evokes in its observer. The
personal associations made with warmth and the different
meanings attributed to the warmth concept are numerous.
According to dictionary denitions warm relates to enthusiasm,
liveliness, excitement, friendliness, sincerity, loving, passion,
excitement, or arousal [31]. Warmth may also be associated with
affection and tenderness, comfort and coziness, sexuality, anger
and so on [17]. In terms of associations Heschong [32] states that
things that were once alive and warm themselves, like the fur of
a polar bear rug, or the leather of a chair may carry an association
with previous life and, therefore, seem even warmer. In addition,
materials that keep our bodies warm, like a woolen or eece scarf,
are associated with warmth [17].
1.4. Research on perception and experience
The relationship between peoples perceptions and the technical
properties of a material or surface have been studied primarily in
the eld of psychophysics. The methods used in these studies often
combine two types of data collection: (1) physical measurements
characterizing the materials (stimuli) in terms of their technical
parameters and (2) peoples judgments of sensory intensity. The
evaluations can be recorded by letting participants order the
different stimuli according to the perceived quality of interest, by
rating stimulus intensity on structured category scales or line
scales, by assigning a number relative to a designated reference
sample, and so on [33]. Relationships between the technical data
and participant responses are mostly established through regression and correlation analyses.
Stimuli in these studies are often designed to vary in one
specic aspect (e.g. roughness) in order to study its isolated
effect. Unfortunately, the need for experimental control often
prevents the use of commercially available materials as stimuli,
which limits the studys external validity [34]. In addition, these
studies often limit themselves to a single sensory modality. After
years of conducting research on a sense-by-sense approach,
researchers across different disciplines in psychology now
recognize that perception is fundamentally a multisensory
experience. Instead of only focusing on how the individual senses
contribute to specic experiences, research investigating interactions between two or more modalities has recently gained
substantial research interest [35].
In the eld of product design the relation between peoples
perception of materials and the materials physical parameters has
been studied from a more practical point of view. For instance,
Karana et al. tried to identify the sensory properties of materials
which designers nd decisive for creating expressive meanings like
aggressive or professional [14]. Participants were asked to evaluate
the materials of a given product in an interview and rated a list of
sensorial properties using 5-point rating scales. Furthermore, Chen
et al. studied the relationships between the physical properties and
peoples sensory and affective judgments (such as softehard and
playfulenot playful) of 37 packaging materials experienced through
361
the sense of touch [36]. Participants felt the samples in a wooden box
covered by a white curtain. Fenko et al. studied the contribution of
two different sensory modalities (vision and olfaction) to the
experience of freshness [30]. They combined fresh and non-fresh
smells and colors in soft drinks, dishwashing liquids, and scented
candles, and asked participants to assess the freshness of these
products. In the present study, we also want to investigate the
contribution of different senses to multisensory experiences, while
linking technical and sensory attributes to experiential attributes.
We used the studies cited above as references for our research,
because we have no knowledge of similar studies within the eld of
architecture.
362
2. Method
2.1. Participants
One hundred and sixteen unpaid volunteers, 60 female and 56
male, undergraduate and graduate students in Architectural Engineering of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) participated in the
experiment. Ages ranged from 17 to 25 with a mean age of 21.
2.2. Study design
Participants were asked to evaluate building materials either
visually (VIS), by touch (TAC), or by a combination of vision and
touch (GEN). Eleven different material samples were used for the
test. Six of them were original building materials (blue stone,
brickwork, concrete, white plaster, steel, wood).
In addition, a set of plaster control samples was created, which
were equivalent in color to the original building materials. These
ve colored plaster samples allowed us to separate the effects of
color and material on the perception of warmth.
The six original materials were evaluated in each of the three
test conditions (GEN, VIS, TAC). Because the tactile qualities of all
plaster samples were expected to be identical, the colored plaster
samples were only included in the general and visual test conditions (GEN, VIS) and not in the tactile test condition (TAC).
2.3. Stimuli
The selected building materials are frequently used in architecture projects and differ from each other in terms of material
properties and appearance. Several technical parameters that
might be related to a materials perceived warmth are included in
Table 1 for each material. Values for the thermal conductivity, the
specic heat, the density, and the thermal effusivity are based on
different sources [37e41].
The surface prole of the different materials was measured
using a Wyko NT2000 non-contact proler. For each sample, the
arithmetical mean roughness Ra and the root-mean square roughness
Rq were averaged over ve locations (Table 1). The roughness
characterizes the irregularities of the surface. Ra corresponds to the
average height of the bumps of a surface. Rq is the root mean square
average of the height deviations. Both measures are useful for
detecting general variations in the overall prole height [42].
Gloss describes the amount of light that is reected by a surface.
It is represented on a scale from 0 to 100 gloss units (GU) and
determines whether the surface has a mat, shiny, lustrous, or
metallic appearance [43]. Gloss was measured according to the ISO
2813 standard, using a BYK-Gardner Micro-Tri-Glossmeter with
20 /60 /85 geometry. The 60 -geometry is the universal standard
2.4. Procedure
The experiment was conducted in an isolated test room at the
university under controlled lighting conditions. As the focus of the
study is on indoor wall applications, the materials were presented
vertically, at eye-height. The samples had a size of 0.4 m 0.4 m,
which implies that the whole hand could be used to touch the
surface while differences in surface appearance could be spotted
visually. The materials were xed in white mdf-cases in order to
provide a neutral and equal background for all samples. When
participants entered the room, all samples were covered with
a black cloth. Evaluation occurred for one material at a time;
participants were unable to see different materials simultaneously.
A written instruction explained how the participants should
evaluate the samples. They were asked to imagine the material to
cover a full indoor wall. Depending on the test condition, different
instructions for the way of interacting were provided. In the visual
condition the participants were not allowed to touch the materials
and were asked to look at the material from different angles while
staying behind the mark on the oor and without touching the
material. For the tactile test condition samples were covered and
the participants could only experience the materials by feeling
them with their hands. The instructions asked to feel the material
in different ways (e.g., rubbing, pressing, tapping, striking the
surface, .) while keeping the sample covered with the cloth. In
the general condition the interaction with the material samples was
free and unrestricted. Participants were asked to explore the
materials extensively by looking at them from different angles and
by touching their surface. Because people could be biased after
Table 1
Overview of the thermal properties and technical measurements of the test samples.
Thermal measures
Surface measures
Color measures
Thermal conductivity k
Specic heat c
Density r
Thermal effusivity h
Average roughness Ra
Mean square roughness Rq
Gloss (60 )
Gloss (85 )
Lightness L*
Red-Green value a*
Yellow-Blue value b*
Color intensity I*
[W/m K]
[J/kg K]
[kg/m3]
[J/m2 K s1/2]
[mm]
[mm]
[GU]
[GU]
[e]
[e]
[e]
[e]
Blue stone
Brickwork
Concrete
Plaster
Steel
Wood
2.70
850
2690
2485
1.26
1.74
(4.0)
36.0
33.35
0.39
0.19
0.43
0.60
860
1570
900
45.86
62.29
(0.4)
0.1
37.70
17.28
17.84
24.84
2.48
910
2080
2167
2.63
3.87
(1.9)
7.9
71.07
0.03
4.89
4.89
0.42
940
1400
743
12.61
15.59
(3.3)
7.8
93.63
0.49
0.59
0.77
48.64
500
7810
13782
0.92
1.30
46.5
(26.0)
79.79
1.70
0.15
1.71
0.15
1710
620
399
9.46
13.64
(3.5)
1.2
77.12
5.82
19.80
20.64
363
9
8
7
TAC
6
5
GEN
4
3
VIS
cold
having seen or touched the samples for one of the tests, a betweensubjects design was used. The conditions were randomly assigned
to the participants.
For each material sample, a separate questionnaire page was
provided. Participants completed a list of fteen attribute pairs
based on a 9-point itemized rating scale: unpleasantepleasant,
simple patternecomplex pattern, not fragile at alleextremely fragile,
not lively at allevery lively, intense colorepale color, not freshevery
fresh, mateglossy, softehard, not dentingedenting, dark colorelight
color, not massiveemassive, obtrusiveeneutral, smootherough, texturedeat, and coldewarm. After nishing the evaluation of one
sample, the test person ipped the page, covered the material
sample and proceeded to the next sample. In addition, comments
made by the participants during and after the test were recorded.
The sequence in which materials were evaluated differed
between participants according to four different orders for the GEN
and VIS conditions and three sequences for the TAC condition.
Because of the specic test setup, two participants could take the
test simultaneously without interfering with each other. The
duration of the test varied between 14 and 65 min with a mean of
33 min (GEN: 18e64 min, VIS: 20e65 min, TAC: 14e40 min).
warm
1
steel
concrete
white
plaster
blue stone
brickwork
wood
Fig. 1. Plots of the mean responses to the variable warm for the original materials
according to the different test conditions (GEN, VIS, TAC).
Surface measures
Color measures
Thermal conductivity k
Specic heat c
Density r
Thermal efsivity h
LOG (thermal effusivity)
Average roughness Ra
Mean square roughness Rq
Gloss (60 )
Gloss (85 )
Lightness L*
Red-Green value a*
Yellow-Blue value b*
Color intensity I*
VIS
TAC
0.57
0.77*
0.68
0.63
0.80*
0.63
0.64
0.56
0.65
0.27
0.79*
0.95**
0.92**
0.57
0.70
0.66
0.62
0.76*
0.69
0.71
0.56
0.64
0.36
0.85**
0.95**
0.94**
0.64
0.74*
0.78*
0.70
0.88**
0.47
0.47
0.61
0.94**
8
7
6
plaster equivalents
5
original materials
4
3
cold
Thermal measures
GEN
2
1
steel
concrete
blue stone
brickwork
wood
Fig. 2. Marginal means for coldewarm for the original material samples and their
colored plaster equivalents.
warmer
Table 2
Pearson correlation coefcients between evaluated material warmth and physical
measures in the three experimental conditions.
warm
color effect
3
2
1
white plaster
reference
sample
non-color
material effect
-1
-2
colder
364
steel
concrete
blue stone
brickwork
wood
-3
-4
365
366
367
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