Comfort and Support Values Provided by Different Pillow Designs for Individuals With Forward Head Posture

With the change in lifestyle, most physical tasks are now performed by machines. As a result, sitting has become the most common learning posture and office posture, and cervical and lumbar spondylosis are becoming increasingly prevalent in younger people. One-third of life is devoted to sleep, and bad sleeping posture can place incorrect strain on the cervical and lumbar spine, resulting in irreversible and detrimental repercussions if not treated seriously. Sleep disorders have become an important public health concern because they can have detrimental effects on both mental and physical health. A pillow can give adequate support for the head and neck and assist sleepers in maintaining proper neck and thoracic curvature. Studies have demonstrated that a comfortable sleeping pillow helps relax the neck muscles, hence facilitating sleep, and efficiently alleviate pain in the neck, shoulders, back, and head.

While studies on the support and comfort of human contact surfaces generally focus on sitting posture, there is limited information available because the assessment of sleep position is more complex. The main reason behind this confusion is that the human body can take many different positions while sleeping. In supine, prone or side lying positions, the pressure or support properties of the human contact surfaces of the pillow against individuals vary greatly. In addition, head-neck curvatures that vary from person to person can also change their support and comfort needs.

In current research on pillows, assessments can be made subjectively or objectively. Subjective evaluations are made by completing an evaluation form based on the person's self-report after the sleep test. In this evaluation form, the amount of comfort and support that the person gets from the pillow is questioned. Although this method directly reveals one's own thoughts, it has poor reproducibility, the results can be easily manipulated, it takes a long time to be done, and it is not suitable for complex experiments. Objective assessments can be made by analyzing body pressure distributions, EMG signals and anthropometric characteristics of individuals. According to the results of the studies, it has been shown that the evaluation method performed with body pressure distributions is the most effective method. This may be because body pressure distribution can respond quickly to materials used, support arrangements, human weight or lying positions.

Studies have shown that long-term high pressure applied to certain parts of the human body can affect the human central nervous, blood circulatory and endocrine system. In addition, different parts of the human body show great sensitivity to pressure due to differences in subcutaneous tissue and tissue structures. In terms of ergonomics, the pressure perception of the human body can be divided into dull parts and sensitive parts. Dull parts can withstand more pressure, while sensitive parts can only feel comfortable when the pressure is low. Therefore, one of the main goals in pillow selection should be to reduce the pressure applied to sensitive points.

Although it has been reported that the main role of the pillow is to optimize head and neck posture, there are limited studies on its effectiveness in terms of its effect on head and neck posture. About a third of human life is spent in sleep, during which the spine is beyond our conscious control. Therefore, pillows play an important role in maintaining ideal head and neck posture and can change muscle activities.