Abstract
KEYWORDS – Seat, Seating comfort, Body parts, Weight coefficients, Pressure distribution
ABSTRACT
There is still no consensus as to what clear associations of local body parts on the whole body discomfort, and what relationships exist between subjective feelings and different pressure distribution parameters. The subjective evaluation experiments of seating discomfort ratings under the pressure stimulation at five local body parts (i.e. shoulders, back, waist, buttocks and thighs) were carried out, subjective ratings and interface pressure distribution of the local body parts and whole body from 18 subjects were obtained. The regions of back and waist were exhibited the maximum effect on the overall subjective ratings, suggesting that whole body discomfort level might be predominantly determined by these local parts. Correlations for five pressure variables with different body parts differ significantly. The impact factors imply that MeanP is the most negative significant contributors to the subjective feelings, Followed by PeakP and PeakG. The positive association for AREA revealed that increase of the contact area would automatically improve the comfort level.