The white-backed planthopper, Sogatella furcifera (Horváth), is a major pest of rice in China. The outbreaks of S. furcifera in the Yangtze River Valley were affected by natural ecological factors. For example, high temperature (over 35℃) in June and August restricted the outbreaks of planthoppers. However, under high temperature,the microclimate near the water surface of rice paddies where planthoppers inhabited were quite different from that in atmospheric environments. According to those differences, the microclimate near the water surface of rice paddies and atmospheric temperature and humidity were simulated in laboratory. Using constant and fluctuating simulated types, the laboratory experiment was performed to compare their effects on the nymph survival rate, duration of nymph stage, fresh weight of newly emerged adults, adult longevity, female fecundity and egg hatching rate of S. furcifera. Our results revealed that: 1) in case of the microclimate near the water surface of rice paddies, all the biological parameters of S. furcifera had no significant difference between the constant and fluctuating temperature and humidity, and S. furcifera successfully completed the whole life cycle;2) compared to the microclimate near the water surface of rice paddies, atmospheric conditions significantly decreased nymph survival rate, duration of female and male nymph, number of eggs per female and hatching rate, respectively. For example, an important biological parameters, the number of eggs per female reduced by 62.1%. We speculate that the microclimate near the water surface of rice paddies may allow S. furcifera to be immune to the detrimental influence of high temperature in the Yangtze River Valley.