Comparison of furniture with straight versus curved contours. After Sibel S. Dazkir and Marilyn A. Read (2012). Images via Shutterstock.
As a professional involved in workplace design, what do you believe should be the single most important goal of a physical work environment?
If you answered to make people happy, then you’re on to something.
Why is personal happiness so critical? Because when people are happy, they are more productive, more creative, experience less absenteeism and job turnover, and get along better with their peers and employers than when they are dissatisfied.
What many industry professionals would like to know, of course, is how to achieve this often elusive and difficult to define objective through the medium of design.
Here’s one technique that I can offer you: develop spaces and furnishings dominated by curved contours, rather than straight.
I offer this prescription not as a matter of opinion or personal taste, but because a considerable body of scientific evidence suggests that applying such a formal strategy can improve the emotional well-being of a building’s occupants.
Shape, Space, and Happiness
If you want to know what makes people happy, just ask them.
In 2012 a pair of researchers from Oregon State University ran an experiment in which over 100 subjects looked at four computer-generated perspectives of a furniture grouping consisting of a sofa, one or two lounge chairs, a pair of side tables, a lamp, a coffee table, and an area rug.
Two of the renderings contained furnishings that were predominantly curved in outline and detail. The other two showed pieces characterized by straight lines and squared-off shapes, similar to the contrast between the pieces illustrated below.
The researchers took steps to dilute the effects of any variables other than the form factor. For instance, the renderings were printed in grayscale to eliminate the impact of color. Artwork was absent from the walls, while the furnishings lacked decorative embellishments. From a style standpoint, the prevailing aesthetic could be charitably categorized as Comfortably Generic Modern.
The surrounding architectural context was similarly abstract and undefined. It was virtually impossible to determine whether the groupings were located in an office sitting area, a hotel lobby, doctor’s waiting room, residence, or other type of environment.
Subjects viewed both sets of images and were asked to rate them according to how pleasing they found their contents, how much time they would want to spend in the pictured environments, and how sociable the setting made them feel.
The results of the exercise were conclusive: rounded beat rectilinear by every measure.
Now, why would our innate preference for the sinuous over the straight manifest itself in positive aesthetic experiences, improved well-being, and a heightened sense of communality?
To answer that question, ask yourself another: How often have you cut yourself with a spoon?
Most likely never.
Now count the times you have hurt yourself with a knife or razor.
Probably more than once.
Given the relative likelihood of the two outcomes, what do you think happens to your mental state when you come in close proximity to an object with sharp edges or pointed corners? It enters into an elevated state of alert. Not quite overt panic, but enough to prompt your brain to raise your stress levels, sharpen your attention, and inject an element of caution if not fear into your thinking.