Research on impact of indoor odor environment on personnel’semotions based on different physiological indicators

Indoor odor environment is a critical component of the building’s indoor environment. This study investigates the impact of odors on personnel’s emotions and explores the relationship between this impact and physiological indicators. Peppermint and sweet orange essential oils are selected as odor stimulus sources, and urine dopamine and heart rate variability (HRV) frequency domain index LF/HF (ratio of low frequency to high frequency) are used as physiological indicators, combined with subjective questionnaires. The results indicate that, compared with the odorless environment, the presence of sweet orange and peppermint odors makes the subjects who like these two odors feel more pleasant and relaxed. In this context, their dopamine concentrations increases, and the HRV frequency domain index LF/HF decreases. For the subjects who do not like peppermint, the peppermint odor makes them depressed, and the dopamine concentration and HRV frequency domain index LF/HF show the opposite trends to positive emotions. It is feasible to improve personnel’s emotions by creating an indoor odor environment in buildings, and at the same time, it provides a reference for using urine dopamine and HRV frequency domain index LF/HF as objective parameters to assist in analysing the personnel’s emotional changes in the odor environment.