BACKGROUND: Although comfort and discomfort on seats have been widely investigated, their nature is still not well described by literature and it is not known exactly how the interaction between these two phenomena happens.
OBJECTIVE: To investigate the multidimensional nature of comfort and discomfort in aircraft seats as well as their levels of interaction.
METHODS: A comfort-discomfort questionnaire has been given to 1500 passengers in Brazil.
RESULTS: The results brought evidence that comfort and discomfort are different phenomena with a strong negative correlation. At extreme levels, the presence of comfort implies the absence of discomfort; however at the other levels of comfort (minimum to moderate) there is the presence of discomfort. Estimating the scores given by the passengers has allowed them to be placed at scales of comfort and discomfort with their different levels. However, no passenger has achieved the levels of maximum comfort or of maximum discomfort.
CONCLUSIONS: It is possible to infer that comfort, as much as discomfort are multidimensional phenomena and must be evaluated through scales with different levels, since at the extreme levels there is no interaction between the phenomena, but at the intermediate levels the passengers could perceive comfort and discomfort at the same time.
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