See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/342919839

/// FUTURE of Architectural Research

Conference Paper · January 2015

CITATIONS READS
0 596

2 authors, including:

Ozlem Demir
North Carolina State University
4 PUBLICATIONS 1 CITATION

SEE PROFILE

All content following this page was uploaded by Ozlem Demir on 14 July 2020.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

 /// FUTURE of Architectural Research
ARCHITECTURAL
RESEARCH CENTERS
CONSORTIUM 2015

Editors:
Ajla Aksamija
John Haymaker
Abbas Aminmansour
/// FUTURE of Architectural Research

Proceedings of the ARCC 2015 Conference

Architectural Research Centers Consortium
FUTURE of Architectural Research

Editors: Ajla Aksamija, John Haymaker, Abbas Aminmansour

Graphic design: Ajla Aksamija
Editorial assistance: Yi Wang and Thomas Forker
Publisher: Perkins+Will

ISBN 978-0-9847582-0-3

© 2015 All Rights Reserved. Authors retain copyright for individual articles, and are solely responsible for their content.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher.
 /// FUTURE of Architectural Research

Editors:
Ajla Aksamija
John Haymaker
Abbas Aminmansour

ARCC 2015 | Future of Architectural Research 1

TABLE OF CONTENTS
ARCC 2015 Conference Organizing Committee and Technical Committee i

Introduction ii

Advanced Materials and Building Technologies

Adaptive Efficiencies: Responding to Change through Anticipatory Prefabricated Design, Charlotte Styer 12

Apples to Oranges: A Tool for Comparing Building Materials, Liane Hancock 20

Assessment of Annual Energy Enhancement for Tall Building Integrated Wind Turbines (BIWT), 28
Farid Abdolhossein Pour, Matthew Herman and Robert Krawczyk

Bamboo-Steel Composite Structures, Rui Liu and Yushun Li 37

Bi-Directional Thermo-Hygroscopic Facades: Feasibility for Liquid Desiccant Thermal Walls to Provide Cooling 45
in a Small Office Building, Marionyt Marshall

Design for Future Structural Adaptability, Hollee Becker 57

Fusing Design and Construction through Potential Articulations within the Built Environment, 65
Stig Nielsen and Alexandru Dancu

Natural Building: The Viability of Straw Bale as a Sustainable Model for Future Development, Arsenio Rodrigues 74

Surveying Stereotomy: Investigations in Arches, Vaults and Digital Stone Masonry, 82

Shayani Fernando, Rob Saunders and Simon Weir

The Significance of Nanotechnology in Architectural Design, Ming Hu 90

Towards Digital Containerized Factories of Composite Architectural Panels for Complex Shaped Buildings, 97
Daniel Chung and Kihong Ku

Education Buildings and the Potential to Become Net-Zero Energy Buildings, 104
Aydin Tabrizi and Paola Sanguinetti

Environmental, Energy and Building Performance Factors

A Decision-Making Framework for Optimizing Roof Functionality in Sustainable Buildings, 117

Nooshafarin Mohammadzadeh, Nikita Jathan and Soolyeon Cho

A Design Decision Support Tool for Visual Comfort Evaluation under Daylighting Conditions, Dalia Hafiz 126

A Tale of Three Zones, Courtney Goertz, Andrea Calhoun, Garrett Watkins and Alison Kwok 133

Analyzing the Retrofit Potential of Historic Homes in Hot-Humid Climates, 141

Hazem Rashed-Ali, William Dupont, Randall Manteufel and Thomas Thomson

Bridging the Gap: Supporting Data Transparency from BIM to BEM, 149
Mohammed Hijazi, Karen Kensek and Kyle Konis

Building Performance Analysis Considering Climate Change, 167

Yiyu Chen, Karen Kensek, Joon-Ho Choi and Marc Schiler

ARCC 2015 | Future of Architectural Research

 Climate-Responsive Evidence-Based Green-Roof Design Decision Support for the U.S. Climate, 165
Spurthy Yogananda, Joon Ho Choi and Doulas Nobles

Energy Performance and Community Resiliency: A Review of Housing Policy and Programs, 174
Lisa Iulo and Kaitlin O’Brien

Is Naturalness of Elementary School Sites Linked to Student’s Academic Performance and Health? 183
Muntazar Monsur and Ozlem Demir

Life Cycle Assessment of Urban vs. Suburban Residential Mobility in Chicago, Peng Du 188

Method for Estimating Energy Use Intensity Based on Building Façade Features, Chao Yang and Joon-Ho Choi 196

Morphometric Analysis of Daylight Factor, Kairouan Mosque Case, Sonda Ben Amor and Abdelkader Ben Saci 205

Negative Life-Cycle Emissions Growth Rate through Retrofit of Existing Institutional Buildings, 212
Somayeh Tabatabaee, Benjamin Weil and Ajla Aksamija

Net-Zero Energy Retrofits for Commercial Buildings, Yi Wang and Ajla Aksamija 222

Net-Zero Lessons for Architectural Design Education, Mary Guzowski 231

Passive House Informed: The Next Level of Energy Efficiency in Affordable Housing, 239
Amanda Donofrio, Mike Magee and Julie Romig

Quantifying the Impact of Passive Design on High-Rise Buildings, 246

Mohamed Krem, Simi Hoque and Sanjay Arwade

Representing Complexity: Understanding Performance in Integrated Design, Clifton Fordham 255

The Potential of Predictive Modeling and Automated Building Facade Elements to Attain Thermal Comfort, 263
Troy Peters

Urban Climate Change Impacts on Building Heating and Cooling Energy Demand, Pravin Bhiwapurkar 270

Computational Design

A Practical Optimization Method for Choosing Energy and Cost Efficient Massing, 280
Materials and Technologies for a Building Design,
Sandeep Ahuja, Patrick Chopson, John Haymaker and Godfried Augenbroe

Another Approach to Space, Dennis Lagemann 288

Building without Nails: Enabling Flexibility and Structural Integrity through Dgital Prototyping, 296
Basem Eid Basem Eid Mohamed, Frederic Gemme and Aaron Sprecher

Computational Landscape: Data Driven Urban Modeling with Agent-Based System, Ming Tang 303

Evolutionary Parametric Analysis for Optimizing Spatial Adjacencies: A Generative Tool for Architectural 312
Programming, Christopher Boon, Corey Griffin, Nicholas Papaefthimiou, Jonah Ross and Kip Storey

Leveraging Data in Academia and Practice: Geometry, Human- and Building-Performance, Randall Deutsch 320

Toward Optimization and Performance: Assessing Architectural Design through the Integration of 326
Responsive Microcontroller Technologies, Pasquale De Paola

Wicked Tactics - UX/XD: World-Building in Post-Virtual Space, Heather Barker 332

ARCC 2015 | Future of Architectural Research

Is naturalness of elementary school sites linked to
student’s academic performance?
1 1
Muntazar Monsur , Ozlem Demir
1
NC State University, Raleigh, NC

ABSTRACT: A growing body of research has linked the environmental qualities of a school to students’
academic performance. Previous studies showed that air quality around school buildings influences
standardized test scores and attendance rates of students. One particular study revealed that views with
greater quantities of trees and shrubs from classroom windows are positively associated with standardized
test scores and graduation rates in high school students. In many other contemporary studies, increased
contact with nature was found to be positively correlated with better performances of children. However, very
few studies have investigated how the overall naturalness of a school building site may relate to its
elementary school students’ performance. Studies investigating such relationships with younger children in
elementary schools are even rarer. Aim of this study is to address this gap in research and investigate
empirically whether overall naturalness of elementary school environment links to children’s academic
performance.

This study investigates the potentials of available online resources to build a research strategy that can
investigate the relationship between school surrounding naturalness and children’s academic performance.
A pilot data consisted of 20 randomly selected elementary schools located in Raleigh, North Carolina is used
to demonstrate the proposed methodology.

KEYWORDS: School Building, Naturalness of School Sites, Academic Performance, I-Tree

INTRODUCTION
Although the underlying pathways of the effects of green spaces on health are not fully understood, a
number of benefits including improved conditions of physical and mental wellbeing are linked to
greenness/naturalness of surrounding environment. These benefits from exposure to green spaces can be
expected to translate into a supportive environment for academic achievement in children as well. However,
studies investigating the specific effects of school-site naturalness on students’ academic performance are
rare. When it comes to matters of elementary or preschool children, it is difficult to find a single study which
has investigated this phenomenon. The objective of this study is to propose a methodological pathway to
investigate this under-researched phenomenon of the influences of school-site naturalness on elementary
school children’s academic performance.

1.0 LITERATURE REVIEW

Child advocacy expert Richard Louv, in his influential work about the divide between children and the nature,
discussed the lack of nature in the lives of today's wired generation. He calls it “nature deficit disorder”—and
he points to it as a cause of some of the most disturbing childhood trends, such as the rises in obesity,
attention disorders, and depression (Louv 2008). Having visual access to nature is known to be beneficial
across a wide range of contexts. Two studies have given evidence (Taylor 2002, Wells 2000) that views of
nature contribute to self-discipline of adolescent girls and cognitive functioning of children. The first study
investigated the role of near-home nature on three forms of self-discipline among children (Taylor 2002).
The aim to the research was to provide empirical evidence of the power of nature for attention restoration.
The sample of the study was composed of 169 inner-city children randomly assigned to 12 architecturally
identical high-rise buildings with varying levels of nearby nature. The results showed that the more natural a
girl’s view from home was, the better her performance scored in the tests of self-discipline. The second
study (Wells 2000) showed that children who relocated to homes that improved the most in terms of
surrounding naturalness tended to have the highest levels of cognitive functioning. The study had a small
sample size (N = 17) and the author admitted that since the study was longitudinal (same group of children),
the role of naturalness/greenness on cognitive functioning might have been temporary.

View of nature or surrounding naturalness is found to be associated with adults’ physical and mental
wellbeing. Kaplan (1993) reported two separate studies on the presence versus absence of natural window
views. In the first case, workers with natural views reported fewer common health ailments in the preceding
six-month period and higher job satisfaction. In the second study, natural views were related to increased
feelings of privacy and satisfaction; natural views were also associated with lower frustration and increased
patience and task enthusiasm. In a similar line of research, having a view of forested settings was related to
greater job satisfaction and lower stress in a South Korean sample (Sop Shin 2007). Research in the area of
healthcare and physical well-being has shown that window views can influence health outcomes (Devlin and

ARCC 2015 | Future of Architectural Research 183

Arneill 2003). Seminal work by Ulrich (1984) showed that patients recovering from gall bladder surgery who
had views of trees recovered from surgery significantly faster, had fewer negative interactions with nursing
staff, and used fewer analgesic medications when compared with those recovering in rooms with a less
scenic brick wall window view. It was also shown that nature views promoted residential satisfaction and
overall resident well-being (Kaplan 2001). Most of these studies were conducted in different work
environments such as office spaces, residences or hospitals; but findings indicate that similar positive
effects of greenness/naturalness are also likely to motivate children’s performances classroom
environments. However, research studies linking surrounding naturalness of school sites and children’s
academic performances are rare.

Few studies were found which investigated the role of surrounding naturalness or greenness on the
academic performance of students. One recent study (Benfield et al. 2013) examined differences across
multiple sections of a college writing course in two types of identically designed classrooms—those with a
view of a natural setting and those with a view of a concrete retaining wall (Figure 1). Results showed that
students in the natural view classrooms were generally more positive rating the course. Students in the
natural view condition also had higher end of semester grades. This particular study provided
methodological insight and it is among few studies which adopted natural experimental design.

Figure 1: Natural view classrooms had higher end of semester grade (Source: Befield et. al 2013).

Another study showed that in high school students, views with greater quantities of trees and shrubs from
classroom windows were associated with positive academic performance outcomes (Matsuoka 2010). This
study revealed interesting findings regarding the greenness/naturalness of environment. Greener view and
surrounding greenness of campus were found to be positively associated with standardized test scores,
graduation rates, percentages of students planning to attend a four-year college, and fewer occurrences of
criminal behavior. In addition, large expanses of landscape lacking natural features were found to be
negatively related to these same test scores and college plans. On the other hand, the study by Tanner
(2009) reported that when a student needed to take a break from learning, it was easier to get back on track
after taking a quick look outside at a pleasant view than after doodling on paper. Tanner (2009) also
qualified these views and indicated that not all views were beneficial. He differentiated those views indicating
that while a view of a wall or parking lot was not desirable, unrestricted views of nature, wild-life and human
activity areas may provide students and teachers with the much needed quicker mental break.

Table 1: Summary of findings of literature review

Finding Source Scope

Near home nature contributes to self-discipline and Taylor, 2002; Wells, 2000 Similar studies are
cognitive functioning of children needed for school
environment
Classroom windows were positively associated with Matsuoka, 2010, Benfield Similar studies are
standardized test scores and graduation rates in high et. al, 2013 needed for
school students and test scores in college students elementary school
children
Natural view contributes to health and wellbeing of Devlin and Arneill 2003, Similar
adults Kaplan, 2001, Sop Shin investigation is
2007, Ulrich, 1984; Walch needed for health
et al., 2005, and wellbeing of
children

184 ARCC 2015 | Future of Architectural Research

The most important study on the similar topic has only recently been published. This study investigated the
association between the ‘‘greenness’’ of the area surrounding a Massachusetts public elementary school
and the academic achievement of the schools’ student body based on standardized tests with an ecological
setting (Wu et al. 2014). Researchers used the composite school-based performance scores generated by
the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) to measure the percentage of 3rd-grade
students. Surrounding greenness of each school was measured using satellite images converted into the
Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) in March, July and October of each year according to a 250-
meter, 500-meter, 1,000-meter, and 2000-meter circular buffer around each school. Spatial Generalized
Linear Mixed Models (GLMMs) estimated the impacts of surrounding greenness on school-based
performance. Overall, the study results supported a relationship between the greenness of the school area
and the school-wide academic performance. While Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) is a
useful tool, it could not be differentiated between different greenness of surfaces like grassy areas, urban
forests or large/small tree covers, etc. Although, the current research also uses online resources for
collecting data, it adopts a very different technique for data collection of school-surrounding vegetation data
which has more precision in differentiating among different green surfaces and has more statistical
accuracy.

2.0 METHODOLOGY

The pilot data collected for this project used mainly 2 web-based sources. All dependent variable data
related to children’s academic performance was collected from a website called NC School report Cards
(http://www.ncreportcards.org/src/). This web source was used also for many different other control variable
data. Naturalness of a school site is measured by an online urban forest analysis tool called the i-Tree
(www.itreetools.org). The i-Tree is a state-of-the-art, peer-reviewed software suite from the USDA Forest
Service that provides urban forestry analysis and benefits assessment tools. Data was collected from
randomly selected 20 elementary schools located in Raleigh, North Carolina. IBM SPSS software was used
to conduct a multiple linear regression analysis on collected data of dependent variables (academic
outcomes), independent variable (school-site naturalness) and control variables.

2.1. Data on academic performance

From NC School report Cards (http://www.ncreportcards.org/src/), the overall math percentage scores were
collected for the 20 selected schools. This data was treated as the outcome variable (academic performance
of students) in this pilot research project.

2.2. Data on school-site naturalness

The i-Tree software interface allowed the researchers to quantify the school-surrounding environment in
different criteria. The system allowed entering specific land-cover types at the beginning of data collection
and then based on the land-cover type entered for randomly selected data points of the selected site area, i-
Tree can give an estimated percentage measurement for those different land-covers. The biggest advantage
of using i-Tree instead of the NDVI technique used in the Wu et al. study (2014) is that, instead of just
measuring the greenness parameter, it allowed the researcher to differentiate between different natural land-
cover types such as grassy surface, urban forest, water surface, large or small tree areas etc. The statistical
accuracy of i-Tree depends on the number of random points entered for a given area. For demonstration
purposes, only two land-cover classes were created for this project namely tree and non-tree. As more
random points are entered into the system classifying different land covers, the statistical accuracy also
increases. For this pilot project a 500 feet buffer area from the school building was considered as the school-
surrounding site. It is usually recommended to enter at least 500 random data points for a selected site.
However, the purpose of this pilot survey was focused in demonstrating the methodology rather than
providing empirical findings. Therefore, 100 data points were randomly entered for each of the 20 school’s
site buffer area.

ARCC 2015 | Future of Architectural Research 185

Figure 2: i-Tree interface.

Figure 2 shows screenshots of the i-Tree software interface for entering random data points for a selected
site.

2.3. Data on school-site naturalness

Data on several controlling variables were also collected from NC School Report Cards
(http://www.ncreportcards.org/src/) for the 20 selected schools. The controlling factors included crime per
100 students, school attendance, number of books per student, number of students per digital device,
number of teachers, teachers percentage with advanced degree, number of board certified teachers,
teacher experience, and total number of tests taken.

3.0 RESULTS

A multiple regression analysis using the forward technique in the IBM-SPSS software was employed. No
statistically significant association was found between tree land cover (%) and elementary school students
overall math score percentage. In the regression model, the only statistically significant predictor was
number of student per digital device (at p < .05 level). The association predicts that when there are more
students using a single digital device, it is likely that their overall math score would improve. However, the
data presented in the analysis consists only a small sample of 20 schools, and the associated statistical
power is very low. The purpose of this analysis is a demonstration of the methodology rather than
establishing statistical relationships.

Table 2: Multiple regression analysis.

a
Excluded Variables
Collinearity
Partial Statistics
Model Beta In t Sig. Correlation Tolerance
b
1 school_size .041 .182 .857 .044 .863
b
crime_per_100_student .130 .615 .547 .147 .962
b
school_attendance1 .192 .937 .362 .222 .996
number_of_books_per_stud b
.040 .162 .873 .039 .709
ent1
b
number_of_teacher1 -.238 -1.145 .268 -.268 .950
teacher_percentage_with_a b
.132 .613 .548 .147 .927
dvance_degree1
b
board_certified_teacher1 .131 .555 .586 .133 .777
b
teacher_experience_0_3 .029 .133 .896 .032 .940
b
teacher_experience_4_10 -.153 -.739 .470 -.177 .998
teacher_experience_10_ove b
.077 .355 .727 .086 .926
r
b
number_of_test_taken .050 .227 .823 .055 .921
b
Tree land_cover_percentage -.056 -.260 .798 -.063 .944

186 ARCC 2015 | Future of Architectural Research

a. Dependent Variable: overall_math_percentage
b. Predictors in the Model: (Constant), number_of_student_per_digital_device1

CONCLUSION
The aim of this exploratory study is opening a new line of investigation in the field of architecture-human
behavior research. The methodology demonstrated in this paper with the small sample of 20 schools has a
lot of potentials for investigating the unknown associations between school-site characteristics and students
performances. It provides an alternative technique for assessing the naturalness of a site area which can be
used to validate the results found in previous the previous study (Wu et al. 2014) which used NDVI
technique. There are approximately 135,000 public schools in the United States containing more than 53
million of its young citizens. Large scale studies investigating the value of naturalness of school sites may
contribute heavily to the design guidelines and design standards of school architecture to improve health
and performance of young children. It is expected that findings from this pilot study will be valuable for
establishing base findings regarding the argument and provide opportunities for large-scale studies in the
related field of research.

REFERENCES
Benfield, J. a, G. N. Rainbolt, P. a Bell, and G. H. Donovan. 2013. "Classrooms with nature views: Evidence
of differing student perceptions and behaviors." Environment and Behavior. doi:
10.1177/0013916513499583.
Devlin, Ann Sloan, and Allison B Arneill. 2003. "Health care environments and patient outcomes a review of
the literature." Environment and behavior 35 (5):665-694.
Kaplan, Rachel. 1993. "The role of nature in the context of the workplace." Landscape and urban planning
26 (1):193-201.
Kaplan, Rachel. 2001. "The nature of the view from home psychological benefits." Environment and
Behavior 33 (4):507-542.
Louv, Richard. 2008. Last child in the woods: Saving our children from nature-deficit disorder: Algonquin
Books.
Matsuoka, Rodney H. 2010. "Student performance and high school landscapes: Examining the links."
Landscape and Urban Planning 97 (4):273-282. doi: 10.1016/j.landurbplan.2010.06.011.
Sop Shin, Won. 2007. "The influence of forest view through a window on job satisfaction and job stress."
Scandinavian Journal of Forest Research 22 (3):248-253.
Tanner, C Kenneth. 2009. "Effects of school design on student outcomes." Journal of Educational
Administration 47 (3):381-399.
Taylor, A. 2002. "Views of nature and self-discipline: Evidence from inner city children." Journal of
Environmental Psychology 22 (1-2):49-63. doi: 10.1006/jevp.2001.0241.
Ulrich, Roger. 1984. "View through a window may influence recovery." Science 224 (4647):224-225.
Wells, N. M. 2000. "At home with nature: Effects of "greenness" on children's cognitive functioning."
Environment and Behavior 32 (6):775-795. doi: 10.1177/00139160021972793.
Wu, Chih-Da, Eileen McNeely, JG Cedeño-Laurent, Wen-Chi Pan, Gary Adamkiewicz, Francesca Dominici,
Shih-Chun Candice Lung, Huey-Jen Su, and John D Spengler. 2014. "Linking student performance
in Massachusetts elementary schools with the “greenness” of school surroundings using remote
sensing." PloS one 9 (10):e108548.

ARCC 2015 | Future of Architectural Research 187

 Research in architecture, design and the built environment is currently diversifying and reaching new
directions. Technological changes, such as new materials, construction techniques and design repre-
sentations, have accelerated the need for research within design disciplines. Today, research is more
important than ever and it is also becoming an integral component in the design practices. The theme
of ARCC 2015 Conference, the FUTURE of Architectural Research, addresses these aspects and aims
to set the course for the future direction of architectural research. Today, interdisciplinary research ap-
proaches that address advanced materials, building technologies, environmental and energy concerns,
computational design, automation in construction, design delivery methods, and project management
are essential for advancing the state of knowledge relating to the design of built environment.

CONFERENCE THEMES:

• Advanced Materials and Building Technologies: materials, their performance and applications in
architectural design, experimental studies, building technologies and implementations in current
design projects.

• Environmental, Energy and Building Performance Factors: environmental and energy aspects in
buildings and cites, high-performance buildings.

• Computational Design: computational tools and approaches for design, BIM, parametric modeling,
simulations and modeling, use of virtual reality for design.

• Social and Behavioral Research: building use and operation, post-occupancy evaluations, and oc-
cupant satisfaction.

• Building Types and Design Methods: specific building types and their design methods.

• Research in Practice: new modes of research specifically suited for design practices, appropriate
methods, and implementation of results.

• Research and Education in Academia: new modes of research in academic settings, integration of
educational curricula and research.

© 2015 All Rights Reserved

View publication stats