Evaluating the Effects of the Physical Environment on Occupants using Post-Occupancy Building Evaluation Data

The physical built environment has long been an area of interest for researchers and can have large impacts on occupants in terms of their satisfaction and productivity. This research thesis utilizes post-occupancy data in occupied buildings to examine the effects of the physical workstation environment and the broader building amenities on occupants. Multi-variate regression models were used to analyze the data, taking into account demographic and workstation factors, the physical workstation environment, and satisfaction with amenity features. While the explained variance in the regression models were generally small, the results showed significant effects of various demographic factors, workstation characteristics, and physical workstation parameters on components of occupant satisfaction. Analyses of satisfaction with the broader building amenities further illustrated that elements outside of the immediate workstation can influence occupant satisfaction, well-being, and organizational productivity.