Dwell Time Planning for Break Areas to Facilitate Informal Communication

Dwell Time Planning for Break Areas to Facilitate Informal Communication | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Article Dwell Time Planning for Break Areas to Facilitate Informal Communication Miu Sumino, Yu Nakayama This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-7700774/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Under Review Version 1 posted 13 You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract In recent years, as the working styles of office workers have changed, so have the functions expected of offices. The importance of informal communication in the office has been highlighted, and various spatial and furniture designs, as well as initiatives to promote such communication, have been proposed. However, a major challenge has been the lack of quantitative evaluation and forecasting methods. Therefore, this study focuses on break areas in offices and proposes a design method for dwell time to promote informal communication. A multi-agent simulation is conducted to mimic the floor structure and worker behavior of a real office, and the time spent in the break area required for a given number of encounters between workers. In building the behavior model, data assimilation was performed by extracting worker movement frequencies and routes based on observational data in the real office environment. The simulation results were compared with the results of actual observations of people flows to verify the effectiveness of the proposed method. Physical sciences/Engineering Physical sciences/Mathematics and computing Full Text Additional Declarations No competing interests reported. Cite Share Download PDF Status: Under Review Version 1 posted Editorial decision: Revision requested 08 Dec, 2025 Reviews received at journal 23 Nov, 2025 Reviewers agreed at journal 18 Nov, 2025 Reviewers agreed at journal 14 Nov, 2025 Reviews received at journal 12 Nov, 2025 Reviews received at journal 25 Oct, 2025 Reviewers agreed at journal 25 Oct, 2025 Reviewers agreed at journal 23 Oct, 2025 Reviewers invited by journal 23 Oct, 2025 Editor assigned by journal 16 Oct, 2025 Editor invited by journal 07 Oct, 2025 Submission checks completed at journal 06 Oct, 2025 First submitted to journal 06 Oct, 2025 You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. 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