Research Area 2
Understanding How Physical Environments Can Support Sustainable Behaviors And Decision-Making
Enhancing the effectiveness of strategic messages in physical environments
Journal Paper (2021 Journal of Environmental Psychology)
Conference Poster (2019 Healthcare Symposium)
Collaborators: Dr. Mardelle Shepley, Dr. Jeff Niederdeppe, Dr. Andrea Won
Challenge: Health information is found in various physical environments differs in attributes such as noise. Yet people often do not notice or remember health information embedded in these contexts.
Research Question: Does the effectiveness of a message depend on where it is located?
Research Techniques: Simulation and survey.
Findings: A message with a noise-related visual cue in a noisy environment can enhance message elaboration.
Implications for Practice: Communicators can enhance the effectiveness of strategic messages by designing them in ways that consider physical environmental attributes in which they are likely to be experienced.
Improving alertness, vigilance, and memory when performing repetitive tasks
Journal Paper (2020 Environments and Behavior)
Conference Presentation (2019 International Communication Association)
Collaborators: Dr. May Oo Lwin, Shelly Malik
Challenge: Past studies revealed enhancing effects of scent on alertness, vigilance, and memory. However, the role of scent and its emission method, in repetitive tasks over long durations, in promoting alertness, vigilance, and memory has yet to be studied.
Research Question: Does scent improve alertness, vigilance, and/or memory when one is performing a repetitive task over a long duration? If so, does the emission technique play a role?
Research Techniques: Eye-tracking, simulation, and survey
Findings: Scent enhanced alertness and information recall. Intermittent emission showed stronger effects than continuous emission in improving memory. The scent did not appear to promote greater visual vigilance.
Implications for Practice: Organizations may consider emitting arousing ambient scents, particularly peppermint, intermittently in the workplace to promote alertness and memory, which may boost workforce productivity.
Improving hand hygiene compliance in hospitals
Journal Paper (2016 American Journal of Infection Control)
Conference Presentation (2016 Healthcare Design Conference)
Collaborator: Dr. Rana Zadeh
Challenge: 1 in 20 patients admitted to hospital acquires healthcare-associated infection. Although hand hygiene compliance is a top infection prevention measure, achieving high levels of compliance has been difficult.
Research Question: Does maximizing the visibility and accessibility of hand hygiene stations affect hand hygiene compliance in hospitals?
Research Techniques: Prototyping, simulation, contextual inquiry, and thematic analysis.
Findings: When the visibility and/or accessibility of a hand sanitizing station increase, its usage frequency will increase.
Implications for Practice: Strategic placement of hand sanitizing stations may increase cost-effectiveness of interventions by increasing usability of hand hygiene resources.
Understanding how “ tiny houses” affect sustainable behaviors
Conference Poster (2019 Environmental Design Research Association Conference)
Collaborators: Dr. Matt Lunde, Amanda Tang
Challenge: Sustainable intentions do not always translate to sustainable behaviors. Cite and state policies do not always produce sustainable housing and health behaviors.
Research Question: How does “downsizing” (i.e., the process of living in tiny house) affect health behaviors?
Research Techniques: Contextual inquiry and thematic analysis.
Findings: When one owns a “tiny house”, one may better understand how little s/he needs, and how much s/he can potentially save from other activities such as eating out. The act of “scaling down” may trigger a domino effect causing one to think about the value of quality (versus quantity).
Implications for Practice: Improved understanding of sustainability behaviors across contexts may allow policymakers to create more effective policies aimed at generating super-additive sustainability behaviors.