Indoor environment quality (IEQ) factors

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Question

What established or possible indoor environment quality (IEQ) factors exist? What kind of dose-responses have been defined for them?

Answer

Indoor environment quality (IEQ) factors(-)

Obs	Exposure metric	Response	Response metric	Exposure route	Exposure unit	ERF parameter	ERF	Significance	Description/Reference
1	Visible dampness and/or mold or mold odor	Respiratory health effect		Inhalation	yes/no	OR	several, see Note 1		Note 1
2	Dampness and/or mold	Depression		Inhalation, Other?					Note 2
3	Dampness and/or mold	Mental health problems		Inhalation, Other?					Note 2
4	Dampness and/or mold	Self-assessed health poorer		Inhalation, Other?					Note 2
5	Dampness and/or mold	Mental health problems		Inhalation, dermal and ingestion	yes/no	OR	1.76 (1.17-2.66)		Hopton and Hunt (1996)
6	Chronic illness	Mental health problems		not applicable	yes/no	OR	1.99 (1.32-3.02)		Hopton and Hunt (1996)
7	Living with children under 16 y	Mental health problems		not applicable	yes/no	OR	1.75 (1.15-2.68)		Hopton and Hunt (1996)
8	Living in a low income household	Mental health problems		not applicable	yes/no	OR	1.61 (1.06-2.44)		Hopton and Hunt (1996)
9	Respondent unemployed	Mental health problems		not applicable	yes/no	OR	1.55 (0.99-2.42)		Hopton and Hunt (1996)
10	Wood smoke	Respiratory health effect		Inhalation					Note 3, Note 4
11	Wood smoke	Irritation of eyes and mucosa
12	Wood smoke	Respiratory health effect		Inhalation
13	Wood smoke	Odour problems		Inhalation
14	Wood smoke	Comfort of housing
15	Wood smoke	Chronic infections		Inhalation
16	Wood smoke	Cancer		Inhalation
17	Tobacco smoke	Respiratory health effect		Inhalation
18	Tobacco smoke	Irritation of eyes and mucosa
19	Tobacco smoke	Respiratory health effect
20	Tobacco smoke	Odour problems		Inhalation
21	Tobacco smoke	Comfort of housing
22	Tobacco smoke	Chronic infections		Inhalation
23	Tobacco smoke	Cancer
24	VOCs	irritation symptoms etc.
25	CO2	headache, tiredness etc.
26	CO	headache, tiredness etc.
27	Insufficient air exchange	Headache
28	Insufficient air exchange	Tiredness
29	Insufficient air exchange	Decreased ability to concentrate
30	Insufficient air exchange	Feeling of fug
31	Thermal conditions; heat	Tiredness
32	Thermal conditions; heat	Decreased ability to concentrate
33	Thermal conditions; heat	Increased respiratory symptoms
34	Thermal conditions; heat	Feeling of dryness
35	Thermal conditions; heat	Comfort of housing
36	Thermal comfort (draught or cold)	Mental health problems							Note 2
37	Thermal comfort (heat or cold)	Depression							Note 2
38	Thermal comfort (heat or cold; general perception of thermal problems)	Self-assessed health poorer							Note 2
39	Thermal conditions (cold)	Feeling of draught
40	Thermal conditions (cold)	Comfort of housing
41	Noise	Hearing injury
42	Noise	Sleep disturbance
43	Noise	Stress
44	Noise	Comfort of housing
45	Proximity to traffic	Mortality(?)
46	Radon	Lung cancer							Note 5
47	Relative humidity
48	PM	mortality							Note 3
49	PM	chronic bronchitis
50	PM	lung cancer
51	Reduced space (house/flat)	Depression							Note 2
52	Reduced space (house/flat)	Mental health problems							Note 2
53	Reduced space (house/flat)	Self-assessed health poorer							Note 2
54	Garden	Depression							Note 2
55	Floor level	Mental health problems							Note 2
56	Overcrowding	Mental health problems							Note 2
57	Overcrowding	Self assessed health poorer							Note 2
58	Sensory IAQ	Various health and well-being parameters
59	Maternal employment	Maltreatment of Children		Other	yes/no	OR	2.82 (1.59 - 5.00)		Sidebotham et al. 2002
60	2 - 3 house moves in previous 5 years	Maltreatment of Children		Other	medium vs. low	OR	1.32 (0.77 - 2.27)		Sidebotham et al. 2002
61	4 or more house moves in previous 5 years	Maltreatment of Children		Other	high vs. low	OR	2.81 (1.59 - 4.96)		Sidebotham et al. 2002
62	Accomodation - overcrowed	Maltreatment of Children		Other	yes/no	OR	2.16		Sidebotham et al. 2002
63	Accomodation - council	Maltreatment of Children		Other	Council vs. owned/mortgarged	OR	7.65		Sidebotham et al. 2002
64	Accomodation - rented	Maltreatment of Children		Other	Rented vs. owned/mortgarged	OR	4.47		Sidebotham et al. 2002
65	Social Network Score < 21	Maltreatment of Children		Other	yes/no	OR	3.09 (1.84 - 5.19)		Sidebotham et al. 2002
66	Parental unemployement	Maltreatment of Children		Other	yes/no	OR	2.33		Sidebotham et al. 2002
67	Car use	Maltreatment of Children		Other	yes/no	OR	2.23		Sidebotham et al. 2002
68	house dampness	headache		inhalation, other	yes/no	OR	8.7 (8.1 - 9.3)		Packer et al. 1994
69	Smoking	mental problems		inhalation	yes/no	OR	8 (0.4 - 15.6)		Packer et al. 1994
70	Social life	health problems		other	<21	OR	11.8 (5.8 - 17.8)		Packer et al. 1994
71	Alcohol	health problems		other	yes/no	OR	0.1 (5.3 - 5.5)		Packer et al. 1994
72	Lone adult	health problems		other	yes/no	OR	12.1		Packer et al. 1994
73	Unemployment seeking work	health problems		other	yes/no	OR	6.9		Packer et al. 1994
74	Smoking	chronic respiratory disease	respiratory health problems	other	no	OR	4.36(2.46-7.74)		Blackman et al. (2001)
75	Dampness	chronic respiratory disease	respiratory health problems	other	no	OR	2.10(1.36-3.50)		Blackman et al. (2001)
76	Unwaged household	chronic respiratory disease	respiratory health problems	other	no	OR	1.73(1.24-2.41)		Blackman et al. (2001)
77	Unsafe neighborhood	mental health problems	sleeping/concentration problems, depression etc.	other	no	OR	2.35(1.41-3.92)		Blackman et al. (2001)
78	Chronic respiratory problems	mental health problems	sleeping/concentration problems, depression etc.	other	no	OR	2.35(1.50-3.69)		Blackman et al. (2001)
79	Draughts	mental health problems	sleeping/concentration problems, depression etc.	other	no	OR	2.28(1.41-3.69)		Blackman et al. (2001)

Note 1 ERF of indoor dampness on respiratory health effects

Note 2 WP6 well-being report (password-protected)

Note 3 ERF of PM2.5 on mortality in general population

Note 4 Concentration-response to PM2.5

Note 5 Health impact of radon in Europe

⇤--#: . Comments on Hopton and Hunt (1996):

• Row 5: Are you sure that the only possible exposure route is inhalation?
• Rows 6 to 9: Instead of "no", exposure route should be "not applicable".
• Rows 5 to 9: Use periods instead of commas as decimal points. --Marjo 10:22, 4 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: attack)

←--#: . Comments have been considered. --Juho Kutvonen 13:52, 4 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: defence)

⇤--#: . Comments on Sidebotham et al. (2002)

• Rows 59, 66 and 67 are filled correctly. What comes to rows 60 to 65, small but essential changes should be done in columns "exposure metric" and "exposure unit". An example: "exposure metric" of row 60 should be "2 to 3 house moves in previous 5 years" and the respective "exposure unit" should be "medium vs. low". Based on this example, can you figure out the correct structures of rows 61 to 65? --Marjo 10:41, 4 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: attack)

←--#: . Good revisions, you have the right idea. However, some minor modifications would be appropriate: in row 62 "exposure unit" can simply be "yes/no", as the accomodation either is overcrowded or is not; no other possibilities exist. In row 65 the "exposure metric" should be "Social network score < 21" and "exposure unit" again simply "yes/no". --Marjo 15:44, 6 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: defence)

⇤--#: . Comments on Packer et al. (1994)

• In the paper of Packer et al. (1994) no ORs are given. Instead, they have measured prevalences. Therefore, "response metric" should be "prevalence" and "ERF parameter" should be "percentage unit change".
• Row 69: According the Table 4, "exposure metric" is damp housing and "response" is "smoking". Based on this, can you figure out the correct structures of rows 70 to 73? --Marjo 11:05, 4 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: attack)

⇤--#: . Comments on Blackman et al. (2001)

• "Response metric" should describe how the response was measured: number of cases, incidence, prevalence,... I see that you have filled "response metric" boxes according earlier versions of this table, unfortunately, "response metric" was not used correctly there. The information you now have in boxes "response" and "response metric" all belongs to "response". You could do the following: decide and formulate the most accurate responses and put them into "response" -boxes and empty the "response metric" -boxes. If you can define the response metric, i.e. number of cases, incidence, prevalence etc.. used in the article, you can put it into "response metric" box. --Marjo 14:39, 4 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: attack)

Rationale

An example for RefTag functionality: Pope et al. (2002)

Juho Kutvonen and Salla Mönkkönen Hopton and Hunt (1996)

Isabell Rumrich and Stefania Caporaso Sidebotham et al. (2002)

Soroush Majlesi and Adnan Ahmad Packer et al. (1994)

Jukka Hirvonen and Sami Rissanen Blackman et al. (2001)

Precision and Plausability of Hopton and Hunt (1996)

- Reporting bias: Perhaps ít´s difficult to use subjective data due to reporting bias. This is because people may answer in different ways or they don´t answer at all. In addition, people experience household conditions differently.←--#: . Good points. --Marjo 14:50, 4 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: defence)

- Possible confounding variables were controlled. ----#: . Can you give examples of the confounding variables mentioned in the paper? --Marjo 14:50, 4 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: comment)←--#: . Sociodemographic and economic variables, e.g. age and income. --Juho Kutvonen 12:23, 6 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: defence)

- Selection bias: The sample is clearly not representative of the general population and therefore the analysis focuses on differences within the sample. Thus it´s worth considering if the results can be generalized to whole population.←--#: . Good points. --Marjo 14:50, 4 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: defence)

Precision and Plausability of Sidebotham et al. (2002)

- maltreatment: registration for physical injury, neglect, sexual abuse, emotional abuse

- social class: no allowance for nonworking mothers, no parental social class allocated for single mothers

- nature of relationship with child maltreatment is complex (confounder, cultural values, etc)

- income is not measured directly, but car ownership as a proxy indicator and receipt of welfare payment

- controlling for social factors

- large amount of prospectively collect data

- participation is lower among the maltreated group

- risk of social bias and no way of measuring the effect of such bias

----#: . You have listed correct points that may affect precision and plausibility of the ERF; well done. However, it would be easier for the reader if you would use full sentences or otherwise would explain a bit more in detail how these issues affect the precision and plausibity of ERF.

• What is meant with "social bias" here? --Marjo 15:06, 4 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: comment)

Precision and Plausability of Packer et al. (1994)

- health problems: possibility of headache, mental problems, emotional reactions, social isolation and pain.

- social factors: unemployment, single parent, lone adult and unemployment with sickness or disability

- lifestyle: consumption of alcohol and smoking

----#: . It might be helpful for the reader if you would use full sentences in order to explain how the above issues affect the precision and plausibility of ERF. --Marjo 15:28, 4 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: comment)

- it is still difficult to understand the housing condition because none of the studies are complete and detailed so that direct comparison with the questions cannot be made and measurements of parameters, potential confounding factors as well as clear dose-response relationship should be adjusted for example physical effect of damp is responsible for muscle tension, backache and headache but on the other hand the study poins out that there is a strong relationship between damp housing and adverse health impact. ----#: . I see that the two last points are in concordance with each other. --Marjo 15:28, 4 February 2013 (EET) (type: truth; paradigms: science: comment)

Related files

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Indoor environment quality (IEQ) factors. Opasnet . [1]. Accessed 10 May 2025.