• Project number: F 2579
• Institution: Federal Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (BAuA)
• Status: Ongoing Project
• Planned end: 2026-05-31

Description:

Modern workplaces increasingly require shift and night work. As a consequence, employees are exposed to light at times when the body expects darkness during sleep. This not only results in short-term effects such as fatigue or difficulty concentrating, but can also have long-term negative health effects such as obesity, cardiovascular problems and depression. For this reason, measuring the actual light exposure of employees is important for occupational safety and health. 

Previous studies have investigated the non-visual effects of light on human health under highly controlled laboratory conditions. The future goal is to measure the correlations of the actual individual light exposure in daily life and the circadian rhythm, the so called "inner clock", and the associated effects using light loggers. These portable light exposure detectors can be worn by participants for prolonged periods of time and record extensive data series on illuminance and other light characteristics as well as changes over time. 

The goal of the project is to develop standardised characterisation and calibration procedures for light loggers. This will make it possible to obtain reliable data on the actual light exposure of different occupational groups during the work day and to create occupational profiles via multiple studies. In this way, effects on the circadian rhythm and thus on health aspects, alertness and overall well-being can be identified. Recommendations for lighting can be derived for specific occupational groups. 

In addition, recommendations for good practice for the use of light loggers in field studies, including the evaluation of the recorded data, will be derived.