Does 68 degrees always 'feel' the same?

[derwood]

I'm looking to see if anyone else has observed this. If the house is fully moderated 68 degrees feels kind of cool.

Over the last 2 weeks it was pretty cold and I was burning a lot and the house a good portion of the house would be close to 80 at bedtime. Wake up in the morning and everything had cooled down to 68 but it didn't feel as cool.

I swear there's a difference between 'ramping up' to temp and 'coasting down.'

Anyone else have a similar experience?

 

[SlyFerret]

I don't care what temperature it is, I'm always cold in the morning. Even when the house is at 72 with the furnace running, it still feels cold when I have to get out of bed.

-SF

 

[Chris S]

Not to get too technical.... but heat goes to cold
So if you're standing next to your woodstove ( a radiator) the heat is going to you since you are 98.6 & you feel warm
If you are in your 72 degree house sitting next to a picture window and it's 0 out you will feel cold- your body heat going to the cold glass
That's why I love my heated floors- always radiating towards me

But I still don't like getting out of bed in the morning

 

[Woodrat]

I have noticed the effect and just attribute it to the slow and steady decline in temperature overnite--because it is slow/steady-I think the body can adapt to it better than the see-saw cycling of a furnace

Woodrat

 

[webbie]

Our house feels warm - or at least normal - in the low 60's. The house is newer, so quite tight and has a humidifier in the zoned hot air system. We virtually never have the temp above 68, and hardly ever at that.

Of course, I am not usually short sleeved, either.

 

[dtabor]

I think its a matter of your body being used to the temp while you are in it and then in the AM, when you get out of bed, you are cool so going to the warmer room feels that way??? Probably doesnt sound right but I notice the same thing. I can come downstairs in the AM and Low-mid 60's feels warm compared to the upstairs which has cooled considerably more.

I also notice that Low 70's in the house seems really warm. I was raised in a house where my parents rarely put the thermostat on the furnace above 63. We wore sweatshirts and were comfortable. Now Im still used to that on my own and more than that seems really warm.

 

[woodjack]

When you fall asleep your body temperature drops and you burn less calories - nature's way of conserving energy. Ever fall asleep on the couch watching tv and you want to grab a blanket? Your body temperature dropped. Now, if you sleep under three thick blankets and wear a layer of pj's you may wake up warm. Ever go into the shower freezing naked in a cold house and come out after a long hot shower. You can walk around butt naked and it feels like someone raised the thermostat fifteen degrees? it's your body temp.

 

[billb3]

Ever go into the shower freezing naked in a cold house and come out after a long hot shower. You can walk around butt naked and it feels like someone raised the thermostat fifteen degrees? it's your body temp.

That's called insulation.
Us skinny people can feel the cold on the other side of the curtain and don't come out.

 

[mtarbert]

It is probably because of the humidity...the higher the humidity the warmer it will feel
Mike

 

[SlyFerret]

I'm amazed that there hasn't been more discussion on humidity.

68 degrees can feel very different at different times depending on the relative humidity.

-SF

 

[Henz]

I tell you though, I have a full house humidifier right next to my woodstove. When I have it on and its blowing around it gets cold! obviously has cold water in it!

 

[WarmGuy]

The subjective temperature is a weird thing. I can be sitting with a sweatshirt on reading a book, think it's cold, and find that it's 74 degrees. Other times I can be comfortable and find that it is 66 degrees.

 

[MarcM]

The subjective temperature is a weird thing. I can be sitting with a sweatshirt on reading a book, think it's cold, and find that it's 74 degrees. Other times I can be comfortable and find that it is 66 degrees.

And it's more due to the complexity of the biological systems at work in our bodies more than the complexity of heat transfer and ambient temperature, although naturally they're inter related.

The short answer is, of course, 68 degree air will not feel the same always, as no temperature will always feel the same even to the same person. Like others mentioned, how you perceive ambient will be dependent on how much heat you generate at rest, and while exerting, if you're core has recently been warmed or cooled externally, moisture on your skin, the efficiency and volume of your blood circulation, sweat etc. etc.

One interesting thing a lot of people forget is a person cannot directly sense the temperature of anything except their own skin (or other organ in which they have nerve endings embedded). This explains why a piece of wood sitting outside in the cold and a piece of iron sitting outside in the cold do not feel the same temperature. The iron "feels" colder because it conducts heat from your skin faster and hence your skin temperature drops faster, when in reality the iron and wood are probably both at equilibrium with their surroundings and in fact are the same temperature.

Consequently, water and water vapor can conduct heat much better than the gases in air (mostly oxygen and nitrogen). So humid air will conduct heat better than dry air. This means if the air is colder than your skin temperature, humidity will make it feel colder. If the air is warmer than your skin temperature, humidity will make it feel hotter.

Well anyway, there are a myriad of other things I could touch on that go into perceiving temperature, but that should give anyone an idea that it isn't a very simple subject.

 

[Henz]

so basically turning on the humidifier to increase the relative humidty will make you feel colder until the air is warmer than your body temperature???

 

[MarcM]

so basically turning on the humidifier to increase the relative humidty will make you feel colder until the air is warmer than your body temperature???

Skin temperature, not core temperature, since you exchange heat with your surroundings via your skin (and mouth, to a certain extent).