
Chilly at Work? A Decades-Old Formula May Be to Blame - donohoe
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/04/science/chilly-at-work-a-decades-old-formula-may-be-to-blame.html
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gtk40
At my office, which is business professional, it seems that men have less
options for "lighter" clothing than women though. I have to wear a long
sleeve, pressed shirt and tie, pants, and dress shoes no matter what the
temperature is (although the coat is optional). Women can get away with short
skirts and dresses that are much cooler.

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alistairSH
This. If we bump the office temperature 5* without adjusting the dress code, I
end up sweaty and miserable.

I'm not allowed to wear sandals and a skirt; let me wear shorts and flip-flops
and you can set the thermostat wherever you want.

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davidw
It would make sense, in a lot of ways (money saved, better for the
environment), to have people dress properly for the conditions, rather than
requiring uniforms that are ill-suited to the climate.

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WalterSear
This feels like a manufactured gender controversy.

IMHE, there tend to be equal numbers of men and women on each side of the
thermostat wars. Or, just as often, we are all on one side, with the person in
control of the thermostat on the other.

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wisty
It's not entirely manufactured.

Women have lower skin temperatures, and higher core temperatures. So in lab
conditions they feel the cold more.

Tracking down a semi-academic article, it noted that in non-lab conditions,
people are well aware of their heat tolerance, and generally wear warm clothes
if they're going to be cold.

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homulilly
This article seems kind of dumb. It briefly mentions that people who are too
warm can only take off so many articles of clothing but then drops it when
it's really the most important factor. If you're cold you can put on a sweater
or a blanket. If you're too hot you have just have to sweat it out and be
miserable.

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Shivetya
considering what our dress code permits and what HR overlooks it is little
wonder some women are freezing. When you have half the clothing on another
does I would expect you to be cold. Throw in that most of the clothing seems
lighter in material usage and it just magnifies the effect.

Simple examples are required shoes, men cannot wear open toe or anything close
to what women wear based on fashion. Similar to covering the legs, shorts are
out but short skirts pass muster. Its an odd world but it tends to get abused
a bit more on the woman's side because most male managers are afraid to say
anything and HR only steps in the most egregious examples

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maerF0x0
IMO winning this battle will involve changing culture--

changing what is appropriate to wear to work. If I could wear shorts and a
muscle top to work, then i'd say just float with the ambient outside (upto
90f) .

But because some of us have to wear suits and ties. Its really hot, plus
stress/exercise etc, it could literally be a health risk for some men.

Compare health risk to inconvenience of wearing more clothes and having a
personal heater and it seems clear to me.

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AcerbicZero
I'm not suggesting freezing anyone to death, but its a lot easier to toss on a
layer of clothing compared to the alternative. Granted, the article mentions
this, it just seems preferential to have an office a bit too cold rather than
too hot.

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davidw
That's something I miss about Italy: less air conditioning. Oregon summers are
beautiful - warm, sunny, but low humidity. For people who don't have to be in
a suit and tie, there's not really that big a need for AC. And yet, I have a
sweater myself for the office.

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homulilly
Do you live in Oregon now because that has definitely not been the case for
the past 2 years.

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davidw
My family and I moved to Bend. Even 35 C here is pretty tolerable if you're
not out under the direct sun, because the humidity is so low, and there's
often a bit of breeze.

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groby_b
It's kind of interesting - we can turn this into a gender debate, where either
the evil men freeze the poor women, or the evil women in their skimpy dresses
sweat the poor men.

Or we can assign blame where it's _actually_ due: Zoned temperature control in
offices is perfectly possible. Buildings that maintain a decent climate
without excessive cooling/heating is possible as well.

But that costs money, and most companies don't want to spend money just to
make their workers feel OK. They'll adjust, or so the thinking goes.

I'd suggest we look there, as opposed to telling each other what we're
supposed to wear/not to wear.

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pen2l
Wow, extremely fascinating to see this war is happening-- because I'm a part
of this war everyday at work, except I'm a male and I'm fighting these wars
with males. Particularly, it's a war against thin people (me) vs those who
have a lot of fat. I lost the war though, mostly because my adversaries are my
higher ups. I now keep sweaters and jackets at work... Even when it's 95 deg
outside (temp in our office is set to 65)

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maerF0x0
Its not just fat. Its metabolism. Lean people who have exercised in the past
24 hours will likely be warmer.

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norea-armozel
Wow, this article sort of explains my situation fairly well. For years I use
to get around on a bicycle to/from work and school. So, I was exposed to the
hot Kansas summers so much so that I can't really tolerate temperatures below
75 F without at least a long sleeve shirt on. Just for the record, I'm
biologically male (even though I'm mtf trans). So, you could say I'm on the
end of the normal curve of this situation.

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crazygringo
Here in NYC, I've always been confused by how offices are sweltering in winter
from heating, and freezing in summer from AC -- the thermometer on my desk
will easily read 82°F in winter, and 68°F in summer.

But what confuses me even more is how people _still_ dress for the season --
guys are walking around, in the office, in sweaters in the winter, and in
shorts and sandals in the summer.

Sometimes I wonder if it's all just psychological...

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zobzu
I had a good laugh. Sadly some people may see this as serious journalism.

Many offices are a little too cold - but this has little to do with gender.
Fat, or/and high metabolism ppl can wear tshirts at best but cant run around
naked. Lean and slower metabolism ppl can put a sweater on. Heck i even take
it off for meeting because dress code.

For the record, im in the sweater category. Now then again offices with temp
lower than 70 are a lil crazy.

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petercooper
Very interesting to see this. Our office is 2 men, 2 women and we have this
argument constantly. The men are sweating their nads off, the women freezing
cold - often simultaneously unless one side temporarily wins by changing the
setting without anyone noticing. Our solution is going to be rearranging the
office so the men are sat directly under the A/C.

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jimmaswell
Maybe we should examine the obsolete concept of "professional attire" at non-
public-facing parts of the workplace. Is there any proof that wearing a suit
makes you more productive? Are profits going to go down if people start
showing up to work in shorts, tshirts, and sandals?

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ars
Looks like bad science to me:

"the researchers tested 16 women"

But if you don't also test some men in the exact same chamber you know nothing
because you have no control to compare to.

You can't just compare to published studied because you don't know if your
equipment is properly calibrated.

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ddmf
I live in Scotland and the reverse is the issue here: mostly women with
personal space heaters turned up to max to ignore the thermostat (because that
means it heats up quicker, right?) which then causes the temperature to rise,
they get normalised to the hot temperature and complain about the rest of the
building being cold so find extra personal space heaters...

Meanwhile, I'm what's known as a "hot tatty" and melt when I'm wandering
around the building, but mostly because our central heating is off because the
computerised heating system has decided that the rest of the building is too
warm thanks to these personal space heaters throwing megawatts of power away
into the ether...

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breischl
Looks to me like they wrote an entire, serious article just so they could work
in the sentence "I wouldn’t overestimate the effect of cleavage, but it’s
there."

Which may also explain why the thermostat will end up higher... :)

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6t6t6
In this world there's two kind of people: \- Those who hate AC. \- Those who
know how a thermostat works.

To the employers: \- Buy AC that are powerful enough for the office room. \-
Have the office in a well insulated building. \- Keep the office at 20°C (68F)
in winter and 26°C(80F) in summer. If you can also keep the temperature
stable, everybody will be happy.

To everybody: \- If you see someone setting the AC at 16°C in summer or 30°C
in winter, you are allowed to revoke this person's rights on the remote AC
forever.

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russell
Naked men and women bundled for the arctic doesnt seem quite right for me. I'm
older and like it a little bit warmer, so I sympathize with the ladies. I just
add a sweater, but then my girlfriend says that I have the fashion sense of a
mule.

Summers are the worst. Often the thermostats are in sun-facing offices, and
the worker bees are in a windowless open plan cave. Some poor sod gets to sit
under the vent with a chill factor of 40 degrees. My compromise is to
telecommute.

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jakejake
As far as I'm aware most thermostats don't really factor in humidity which has
a big factor on my comfort. When I'm at home on a relatively mild summer day,
my house actually feels uncomfortably warm. When it's blisteringly hot outside
my AC goes into overdrive and turns my place into an icebox - even though the
temperature is always set the same at 72.

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kdjenkins
I wonder whether LEED certification, with its energy conservation
requirements, has an impact on climate satisfaction. Are the women, on
average, more comfortable and the men less?

In any case, I worked in a newly built, open plan, LEED certified building and
was surprised by the inconsistency in temperature on the same floor.

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radicalbyte
What happens to the argument about energy efficiency in winter in cold
climates? ;)

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davidw
Same thing: you should probably be comfortable in a sweater in the office in
winter.

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thinkingkong
Among the many factors in that equation, using a 40 year old male weight
154lbs seems a little off too. Is that actually the median age and weight of
office workers these days?

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maerF0x0
Many designers know that you do not design for the average, but for the edges.
The middle figures itself out. So how do we accommodate 200lb guys who weight
lifted this morning and 100lb girls who havent exercised in a while? Maybe
some kind of climate zones? It usually a lot easier to get warmer (clothes)
than to get cooler (less clothes isnt usually appropriate) .

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Zikes
Men tend to prefer 70 degrees and women tend to prefer 75. 72.5 sounds like a
reasonable compromise.

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nathas
Sounds like no one is happy then.

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scholia
Maybe the women could wear warmer clothes?

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darkstar999
Or the men could go naked!

