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The use of an air conditioner (AC) becomes essential, particularly in a hot and humid climate, to provide a comfortable environment for human activities. The setpoint is the agreed temperature that the building will meet, and the use of the lowest setpoint temperature to accelerate the cooling of indoor spaces should be avoided. A comprehensive field study was conducted under various cooling temperature settings in two student activity rooms in a university building in Malaysia, so as to understand respondents’ characteristics and behavior toward AC usage, to estimate the comfort at various indoor temperatures, to develop an adaptive model of thermal comfort in AC spaces, and to compare the comfort temperature with related local and international indoor thermal environmental standards. The findings indicated that water intake and clothing insulation affected personal thermal comfort. Moreover, the mean comfort temperature for respondents was 24.3 °C, which is within an indoor thermal comfort zone of 23–27 °C. The findings suggest that the preference of occupants living in a hot and humid region for lower temperatures means that setting temperatures lower than 24 °C might underestimate the indoor comfort temperature. Additionally, an adaptive relationship can be derived to estimate the indoor comfort temperature from the prevailing outdoor temperature.

Maintaining a thermally comfortable environment is essential for student well-being and academic performance, especially in regions with consistently high ambient temperatures. The research employs a combination of field measurements and Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations to analyse thermal comfort parameters under a range of indoor temperature conditions, from 22 °C to 28 °C. Key indicators such as Predicted Mean Vote (PMV), mean radiant temperature, and operative temperature were evaluated in accordance with ASHRAE 55, ISO 7730, and MS 1525 standards. The results show that PMV values remain within the comfort zone (–0.5 to +0.5) when supply air temperatures are maintained between 22 °C and 24 °C, while values exceed +1.0 at 28 °C, indicating increased discomfort. Zone-by-zone analysis revealed that rear classroom zones experienced higher PMV (up to +1.8), and PMV variability exceeded 0.15 in certain zones, suggesting spatial discomfort. The study also identified a linear increase in PMV with air temperature (R ² = 0.91), and the simulated temperatures deviated from experimental measurements by an average of only 0.32 °C. These findings highlight the critical role of precise HVAC temperature control and air distribution in achieving uniform thermal comfort in tropical university classrooms.