Light and Health

As human beings, daylight is an essential part of a healthy life. Sunlight not only tell us when it is time to wake up and go to sleep, it affects hormone levels in our bodies and also provides us with Vitamin D. Being exposed to the right amount of light at the right times of day is critical to living a healthy lifestyle. After reading three articles about the affects of daylight and electric light on humans, I have learned a lot of new information that will be helpful when thinking about design.

The first article, Influence of Architectural Lighting on Health, talks about the importance of the daily, or circadian, light patterns and how we are affected by them. According to this article; less than a decade ago, a new receptor cell called the ganglion cell, was discovered in the human eye. This cell senses changes in light patterns. The information that is received by this cell goes on to affect several other systems in our bodies. Everything from our cardiac and immune systems to cognitive and emotional responses are affected by light.

Another thing that the article talked about was the fact that not only daylight, but darkness is important to the health and well-being of people as well. The fact that darkness plays a role in our health as well was something I personally was not aware of. According to the article by Edelstein, research has been done that shows increased cancer rates in people who work night shifts. Nurses, factory workers and flight attendants that work at night and have constant exposure to electrical light and daylight are suffering adverse affects.

The article from The Washington Post also confirms this correlation between exposure to light during the nighttime and cancer. According to this article breast cancer rates of women who work night shifts are sixty percent above normal. It was also found that breast cancer rates were thirty-seven percent higher in towns that had more electric lighting at night. This is thought to be because of the correlation between darkness and our bodies’ production of melatonin, which is a hormone that promotes sleep. Melatonin production decreases when we are exposed to light, both sunlight and electric light. Also, new, energy-efficient fluorescent light bulbs have been shown to suppress melatonin production more than older incandescent bulbs.
So, while fluorescent bulbs may have many advantages, it seems that their affects on health may need to be researched more before they become a standard.

As designers, we need to think about not only how to get daylight into a space effectively, but also how to block it from coming into a space when necessary. I think many times we can get too caught up in trying to bring in as much daylight as possible that we don’t consider that more daylight is not always better and sometimes darkness is desirable. Even when we do want a lot of sunlight in a space, we need to have a way to control and direct it in order to control things like temperature and glare in a space. Also, we need to be careful when choosing appropriate electric lighting. Each kind has benefits and drawbacks and it is important to become familiar with all them before deciding which type of lighting is best. Hopefully in the future there will continue to be more advances in electric lighting so that we can have ones that are energy-efficient and safe as well.

The way lighting affects people, both positively and negatively is important to take into consideration when thinking about the design of spaces. When designing the lighting in a space it is necessary to look at who will be using the space and for what kinds of activities. There is not one single solution to lighting design, each space needs to be considered individually. As designers, it is our job to consider all the options and make decisions that will create the best lighting options for the space and the people using it.