Unveiling User Actions: A Novel Framework for Decision-Making in Design and Operation of Healthy, Responsive, and Sustainable Buildings

The impact of user behaviour on the building's operational model is one of the key research topics in recent years, given the vulnerability of buildings linked to user behaviour (i.e., energy use variance) and their safety and health risks (e.g., sick building syndrome). Available solution strategies and optimization approaches, such as behavioural and people-centred aspects, yet require high economical and computing costs (e.g., facilities, sensor deployment, maintenance, data collection, processing, and storage), high data accuracy and communication stability. In addition, remain closely tied to assess domains individually and with low system interoperability, resulting in limited system responsiveness worsened by inadequate privacy management policies. This work introduces a pivoting new approach to building design and operation by understanding the complex interactions between users and the built environment, encompassing physical, visual, and sensory dimensions. Unlike conventional methodologies relying on survey-based behavioural sampling or sensor data analysis, this proposal employs direct observation of behaviours, associating them with environmental and perception triggers, based on the assumption that no interventions imply acceptance of the surroundings (tacitly assessing adaptation and tolerance). The study structures and weights the associations between user action/interactions with diverse building elements/objects (e.g., windows, shading devices, doors), facilitates the promotion of pro-environmental behaviours by enabling a rapid identification and evaluation of the distributed impacts on different domains (i.e., health, well-being, safety, energy efficiency, privacy, accessibility), and enables data management cost reductions in smart buildings (i.e., fosters lower data storage needs and data-driven model complexities).