The American Academy of Interior Designers awarded the 2017 Joel Polsky Academic Achievement Award to Jeffrey Neo Ph.D. ’20 for his master’s thesis examining how spatial design and management approaches can impact hand hygiene and infection control practices in healthcare environments.

Neo, a Ph.D. student in human behavior and design, says he was surprised and honored to receive the award given he does not have training in interior design. He credits the ability to work across disciplines at the College of Human Ecology with offering him different intellectual perspectives.

“My approach is to seek insights and expertise from interdisciplinary fields such as bioethics, healthcare design, and psychology, and then to translate this research into clinical practice to improve patient and health outcomes, in order to generate advances in healthcare design,” Neo said. “The interdisciplinary exposure and training I have received over the years has certainly helped shape my research philosophy.”

For his thesis, Neo studied the relationship between spatial design for visibility and traffic flow and the frequency of hand sanitizing station use in three inpatient units of a community hospital. His research, which included developing electronic motion sensors to monitor sanitizing station use, found a significant correlation between visibility and traffic flow and frequency of station use. 

Neo traces the genesis of his research back to a course he took in his first year of graduate school.

“I took a senior level class, “High Impact Facilities of the 21st Century,” taught by Professor Rana Zadeh,” he said. “Due to the nature of the class, I was able to work on consulting projects for real clients, and view facility design and management from a holistic perspective. A raw idea I had from the class eventually evolved into my M.S. thesis, which was supervised by Professor Zadeh and Professor Sean Nicholson.”

An undergraduate internship with the Health Sciences Authority of Singapore sparked Neo’s interest in health care facilities design, particularly in how a holistic understanding of the social, psychological, and health needs of patients can assist in evidence-based design. Neo initiated a restroom satisfaction survey, finding that, on a statistically significant level, female and male patients provided different ratings on restroom designs, satisfaction levels, and even on their awareness of health messages and restroom hygiene advisories.

“In my four years at Cornell, I have been continually impressed with the amount of support and help I’ve received from the faculty and staff,” Neo said. “Graduate school and research can be a stressful and at times lonely experience. The constant support and concern from several faculty including Professor Mardelle Shepley, my dissertation chair, Paul Eshelman, and Rhonda Gilmore – just to name a few – have kept me motivated over the years.”

For his doctoral research, Neo is examining and developing innovative strategies in understanding how the interaction between communication, psychological and environmental design, may influence the effectiveness of health-risk information in health care environments.