Abstract
Two studies, comprising 128 participants, were conducted to examine possible detrimental effects of noise and moderate heat stress on decision making. Three tasks involving risky decisions were used: a lottery choice task, the Balloon Analogue Risk Task, and two risk scenario questionnaires. Study 1 (n = 97) involved three noise stressors presented at 60dB(A) and a quiet condition. Compared with all other conditions, a radio podcast about the jubilee of museums caused a significant increase in risk aversion in the Choice Dilemma Questionnaire task. Study 2 (n = 31) compared two groups that completed the aforementioned tasks either in a warm (≥ 30°C) or neutral (≤ 25°C) ambient temperature condition. Participants made significantly riskier decisions in the warm ambient temperature condition in all tasks except the lottery task. Effects were more pronounced among female subjects. Especially elevated ambient temperatures should, therefore, be monitored in office environments to prevent impairments of decision making.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
