26/10/2019
Psychological Effects of Color
Report: Are Your Walls Crushing Creativity?
By, David Gehrke, MBA President, Colorado Faux Painting Inc. June, 2012
What hidden dangers are on your walls right now?
The 4 critical secrets you need to protect your family from these devastating effects!
Discover...
~How Color is Effecting Your Children
~How Your Walls May be Creating Chaos
~What You Can Do To Change it
How is color affecting our children?
Color in is known to be one of the first emotional ties made psychologically in the beginning stages of childhood development. In fact, it is one of first things children learn to respond to with respect to their emotional development during their formative years. According to Erin Wood,
[“Color perception and its psychological implications are encompassed among all stages of life development – especially childhood. Children respond to color even before they respond to shape. The importance of this is utilized when analyzing children’s drawings for the sake of clinical psychology. Color allows interpreters to access a completely different insight into personality because of color’s close relationship with emotion.”] 2003. A Psychological View of Color and Light. http://www.people.vcu.edu/~djbromle/color03/erinwoodPsychologicalcolor.htm
With that in mind, we have to evaluate how color and/or the lack of color (white) affect the human psyche in some of its most basic color formats for people of various age groups. We then must realize that these same psychological effects are only compounded in children. To better understand these effects, let’s review the psychological impact of warm and cool colors.
Warm and cool colors create a physiological response in our bodies based on our minds interpretation of the colors that surround us. Warm Colors: According to Interiordezine.com ,
[“The reds, yellows and oranges of the color wheel are referred to as the warm colors, these colors give the effect of creating more adrenaline, raising your blood pressure, increasing your rate of breath and therefore increasing your temperature, making you feel warm. Obviously, the stronger the color the more intense the effect.” Cool Colors: “The greens and blues of the color wheel are referred to as the cool colors; these slow our heartbeat, relax our muscles and lower our temperature, making us feel cool. Violet can appear warm or cool depending on the proportions of the parent colors. With a larger proportion of blue it would appear cool, and with a larger proportion of red, a warm appearance.”] May, 2012. http://www.color.interiordezine.com/color‐theory/warm‐and‐cool‐colors/
This basic understanding of how color effects our physiology lends insight to why we respond psychologically and/or emotionally to the presence of color.
Conversely, we must then evaluate the effect that a lack of color (white) has on our physiology and psychology.
~Are Your Walls Creating Chaos?
~Does Your House Feel Like an Institution?
We’ve all walked into places that seemed institutional, but did we stop to think why? It’s because every surface in the building was stark white! Hospitals use to be like this because they only gave credence to the sanitary conditions that had to be maintained. However, in more recent years, health professionals have realized that there is a psychological element to healing and white walls were not helping their cause. Consider the following research...
[“In the 1940’s Dr. Hollwich and team started a three‐decade performance of experiments to evaluate the effects of strong artificial light with considerable deviation compared to minimal deviation on healthy individuals. People who were exposed to high levels of artificial light produced stressful levels of the growth and hormone‐producing hormone, ACTH. They also showed above average amounts of the stress hormone, cortisol. ‘Hollwich concluded that this explains the agitated mental and physical behavior of children who stay in school the whole day and are subjected to artificial illumination that deviates strongly from daylight.’"
“So, what is taking place here is that when people are exposed to extremely high levels of artificial light, they experience a physiological response. Biologically they produce excessive levels of hormones that are associated with people in chronic high‐stress situations, such as mourning, or depression, or even patients of fatal diseases. If you combine this with a white environment, (or tones near it, it turns out,) the situation is a recipe for disaster. ‘As early as 1947, Louis Cheskin wrote: ‘White walls as we know, are an optical strain and a psychological hazard.’’”]
~Erin Wood. 2003. A Psychological View of Color and Light. http://www.people.vcu.edu/~djbromle/color03/erinwoodPsychologicalcolor.htm
So, what’s a little stress? Well, a little stress can be managed, but prolonged exposure to this type of white environment producing increased levels of stress hormones can result in memory loss, heart disorders, insomnia, depression, and obesity. Consider the evidence...
[“In the June Archives of General Psychiatry, investigators at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis provide the first direct evidence that several days of exposure to cortisol at levels associated with major physical or psychological stresses can have a significant negative effect on memory.”]
~ScienceDaily (June 17, 1999). http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/1999/06/990617072302.htm
[“Cortisol [the hormone produced by stress] also curbs functions that would be nonessential or detrimental in a fight‐or‐flight situation. It alters immune system responses and suppresses the digestive system, the reproductive system and growth processes. This complex natural alarm system also communicates with regions of your brain that control mood, motivation and fear.”]
~Mayo Clinic Staff. 2010. http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/stress/SR00001
[“The long‐term activation of the stress‐response system — and the subsequent overexposure to cortisol and other stress hormones — can disrupt almost all your body's processes. This puts you at increased risk of numerous health problems, including heart
disease, sleep problems, digestive problems, depression, obesity, memory impairment, [and the] worsening of skin conditions, such as eczema. That's why it's so important to learn healthy ways to cope with the stressors in your life.”] ~Mayo Clinic Staff. 2010. http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/stress/SR00001
With all of these emotional and physiological effects compounded in children, our primary source of evidence that they may be impacted is revealed through their behavior patterns. According to Stanford neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky,
[“In children, the continual release of glucocorticoids [A hormone that predominantly affects the metabolism of carbohydrates and, to a lesser extent, fats and proteins (and has other effects). Glucocorticoids are made in the outside portion (the cortex) of the adrenal gland and chemically classed as steroids. 2011. http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=3609 ] can suppress the secretion of normal growth hormones. ‘There's actually a syndrome called stress dwarfism in kids who are so psychologically stressed that growth is markedly impaired,’ Sapolsky said.”]
~MARK SHWARTZ. Stanford Report, March 7, 2007. http://news.stanford.edu/news/2007/march7/sapolskysr‐030707.html
As responsible parents and individuals, we always consider the environment that our children or we are in. So, why would our home environment be any different?
The result of white walls: A house of stress, chaos, disorder, and an increasing risk of a whole host of potentially chronic diseases.
What Can we do to Change it?
So, you might ask, “How do I make my house feel more like home?”
Answer: We can start by eliminating simple stressors such as white walls and harsh lighting.
If you’re in the Denver area, Call us Today for a Free, No Obligation In Home Painting Estimate and Color Consultation at 303.552.7785 https://www.coloradofauxpainting.com/
If you’re outside of Colorado or want to take action on your own, then here are some basic steps you can take for a more in‐depth action plan...
First step‐ Evaluate family member behavior patterns‐ Example: Laziness, Hyperactivity, Stress, etc.
Second‐ Look at potential causes in the household environment‐ Example: colors that are too warm or too intense on the color wheel could be causing hyperactivity. On the other hand, colors that are too cool on the spectrum could be the cause of inactive children or laziness.
Third‐ Evaluate the desired result‐ in respective areas of the house and decide how you would like it to feel‐ Example: You may want your kitchen to be a place of activity to encourage social engagement and family participation. Warm colors may suit that space and function best. Conversely, you may want a space to unwind and relax after a hard or stressful day at work. This may be a study or a family room. In this instance, soft blues, blue‐grays, and/or various shades of green may be appropriate.
Finally, go through the rest of the house and declare a purpose for each room or sets of rooms and decide which side of the color wheel respective areas or zones of the house need warm colors and which ones need cooler colors. Also try to determine how intense you want the colors to be in contrast to each other with respect to the overall theme and transitions from room to room.
If you find you need an expert to help decipher specific situations, we’re here to help. Questions or inquiries can be sent to [email protected]
We offer free color consultations with the majority of our in‐home estimates.
~Disclaimer: ‐ Colorado Faux Painting Inc nor any of its assigns or employees are licensed psychologists, and make no claim to be able to diagnose or treat any psychological disorders.
~Note: The study of how color affects the human mind has been ongoing for over 6 thousand years, but a comprehensive understanding of its effects are not widely known or documented, due partially to sheer number of color variations that exist and a lack of scientific funding for that scale of endeavor.
A Psychological View of Color and Light Erin Wood Color is elegant. There are, however, ways in which color affects and interacts with us of which we may not be actively aware.
