Exploring daylight and perceived spatial comfort through virtual reality in home environment

This study examines how variations in room brightness simulated in virtual reality (VR), influence-perceived brightness, satisfaction, and spatial comfort in virtual home environment. While VR is increasingly used to simulate various built-environment conditions, its application to assessing spatial comfort in homes remains limited, despite the strong impact of residential spaces on physical and psychological well-being. A within-subjects experiment was conducted with 38 participants who experienced two VR-simulated bedrooms differing in window size. After each exposure, participants evaluated the environment in terms of brightness, satisfaction, and spatial comfort. Results showed that larger windows were consistently perceived as brighter, confirming VR’s effectiveness in capturing daylight variation. However, this perceptual increase did not translate into higher satisfaction or comfort ratings, suggesting that daylight alone cannot fully account for affective and behavioral responses. This research underscores the need for architects to use VR not only as a visual representation of the design, but also as a tool for evaluating subjective comfort during early design decision-making, while highlighting the need to integrate environmental, psychological, and experiential dimensions to inform user-centered residential design.

Text 126140.pdf - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (3MB) Official URL or Download Paper: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13467...

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