Cutaneous Warm and Cool Sensation Thresholds and the Inter-threshold Zone in Malaysian and Japanese Males

Joo-Young Lee; Mohamed Saat; Chinmei Chou; Nobuko Hashiguchi; Titis Wijayanto; Hitoshi Wakabayashi; Yutaka Tochihara

doi:10.1016/j.jtherbio.2009.11.002

Cutaneous Warm and Cool Sensation Thresholds and the Inter-threshold Zone in Malaysian and Japanese Males

J Therm Biol. 2010 Feb;35(2):70-76. doi: 10.1016/j.jtherbio.2009.11.002. Epub 2009 Dec 2.

Authors

Joo-Young Lee¹, Mohamed Saat², Chinmei Chou³, Nobuko Hashiguchi⁴, Titis Wijayanto¹, Hitoshi Wakabayashi¹, Yutaka Tochihara¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Ergonomics, Faculty of Design, Kyushu University, Japan.
² School of Health Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Malaysia.
³ Industrial Technology Research Institute, Technology Center for Service Industries, Taiwan.
⁴ Department of Health Science, Faculty of Medicine, Kyushu University, Japan.

PMID: 28799915
DOI: 10.1016/j.jtherbio.2009.11.002

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate ethnic differences in cutaneous thermal sensation thresholds and the inter-threshold sensory zone between tropical (Malaysians) and temperate natives (Japanese). The results showed that (1) Malaysian males perceived warmth on the forehead at a higher skin temperature (T_sk) than Japanese males (p<0.05), whereas cool sensations on the hand and foot were perceived at a lower T_sk in Malaysians (p<0.05); (2) Overall, the sensitivity to detect warmth was greater in Japanese than in Malaysian males; (3) The most thermally sensitive body region of Japanese was the forehead for both warming and cooling, while the regional thermal sensitivity of Malaysians had a smaller differential than that of Japanese; (4) The ethnic difference in the inter-threshold sensory zone was particularly noticeable on the forehead (1.9±1.2C for Japanese, 3.2±1.6°C for Malaysians, p<0.05). In conclusion, tropical natives had a tendency to perceive warmth at a higher T_sk and slower at an identical speed of warming, and had a wider range of the inter-threshold sensory zone than temperate natives.