Association between visual distance and students’ visual perception comfort in primary and secondary classrooms

Abstract

With developments in information technology, multimedia equipment and electronic teaching aids have been introduced into primary and secondary school classrooms. Thus, traditional “blackboards” have gradually given way to screens, ultimately complicating the visual environment and the visual act of looking at the blackboard. Generally, looking at the blackboard can affect the visual comfort of students when reading from different viewing distances. In this study, 40 primary school students were invited for a visual perception human-factor experiment in a secondary school classroom in Anshan, Liaoning Province, China. The Ergo LAB human-factor platform was used to test the students’ electrodermal indicators at different distances. Moreover, simultaneous subjective scoring was performed to compare and analyse the students’ state of arousal levels and visual perceptual comfort under different visual distance conditions. The acceptable visual distance for students to be able to read from an electronic screen ranged from 2.2 m to 8.5 m; the highest state of arousal and visual comfort were achieved at a visual distance of 4–4.9 m, and the most optimal visual distance was 5.8 m.

Keywords

• state of arousal level
• visual comfort
• primary and secondary school students
• visual distance
• human factors engineering