24.27.PMS.112.2

Perceptual and Motor Skills, 2011, 112, 2, 509-524. © Perceptual and Motor Skills 2011

DOI 10.2466/24.27.PMS.112.2.509-524 ISSN 0031-5125

EFFECTS OF INTERIOR COLORS ON MOOD AND PREFERENCE: COMPARISONS OF TWO LIVING ROOMS1, 2

KEMAL YILDIRIM

Department of Furniture and Decoration Gazi University

M. LUTFI HIDAYETOGLU

Department of Interior Architecture and Environmental Design

Selcuk University

AYSEN CAPANOGLU

Department of Interior Architecture and Environmental Design Hacettepe University

Summary.—The purpose was to assess whether various colors across room interiors do, in fact, evoke different moods. Digital images of two imaginary liv-ing rooms were used as the experimental settings. For each of the experiments, the rooms’ spatial characteristics were fixed, with only the colors changed: either warm, cool, or achromatic colors. As predicted, warm colors tended to produce stronger participant responses when rating the scene on “high arousal,” “exciting,” and “stimulating.” Cool colors tended be associated with “not very arousing,” but to be rated higher on “spacious” and “restful.” It is generally assumed that cool and achromatic colors evoke calmer and more peaceful emotions. The study’s results show that the spatial characteristics of the imaginary spaces themselves affected participants’ responses only on measures of “happiness” and “vividness.” Lastly, sex differences were also found, with women’s ratings generally more positive than those of men.

During the process of perceiving colors, an associated feeling or emo-tion is induced in the brain—a “color emotion.” The human eye perceives color as a stimulus in the form of light and the brain further processes that perception with the result that feelings and emotions are evoked (Billmey-er & Saltzman, 1981). An abundance of research in the field of color emo-tion has indicated that each color, as well as each combination of colors, conveys its own range of meanings (Kobayashi, 1981).

As Mahnke (1996) argued, the psychological effects of color (color psychology) constitute a large, complex field, given the way the various colors induce a range of feelings and emotions in different people. Cer-tain studies of single-color emotional responses have been concerned with whether a large number of color-emotion scales can be reduced to a small-er number of categories, or factors, using the “semantic differential” meth-od introduced by Osgood, Suci, and Tannenbaum (1957) and factor analy-1Address correspondence to Kemal Yildirim, Department of Furniture and Decoration, Gazi University, 06800, Ankara, Turkey or e-mail ([email protected]).2The authors would like to thank Asst. Prof. Dr. Christopher Wilson, Department of Architec-ture, Faculty of Fine Arts and Design, Izmir University of Economics, and Dr. Jody Bilyeu for their careful proofreading of the English text and for their helpful suggestions.

K. YILDIRIM, ET AL.510

sis as first devised by Spearman (1904). In a study of color emotions with regard to simulated interior spaces, Hogg, Goodman, Porter, Mikellides, and Preddy (1979) identified five factors that affect color perception: dy-namism, spatial quality, emotional tone, complexity, and evaluation, and reported that dynamism and emotional tone were connected to the col-or characteristics of chroma and hue, respectively. Gelineau (1981) found that “color value” and “color sensation” may be differentiated into three essential characteristics: “hue,” “tone,” and “chroma,” which describe the warmth, coolness, and brightness of the built environment. The warmth and the coolness of various colors, including achromatic colors, are the subjects of discussion below. Psychological Studies of Reactions to Color

A color’s hue or gradation is determined by its wavelength. Short wavelengths are associated with “cool” colors, with violet being the short-est, followed by blue. Longer wavelengths are associated with “warm” colors, with red being the longest, followed by orange. Research of color usage in interior design has consistently shown that short wavelength col-ors are preferred by users, leading to a general association between affec-tive tone and wavelength (Valdez & Mehrabian, 1994). Experimental re-search has suggested that the cool colors, blue and green, seem to have a relaxing effect and make an interior space seem peaceful, evoking in-creased perceptions of spaciousness, while warmer hues, such as red and orange, seem to have a stimulating effect, and tend to make an interior seem less spacious (Nelson, Pelech, & Foster, 1984; Whitfield & Wiltshire, 1990; Crowley, 1993). According to a study by Levy (1984), color and emo-tion are systematically related. Warm colors were found to especially pro-voke “active feelings,” such as anger from red and sadness from yellow. On the other hand, cool colors were reported to provoke “calm feelings,” such as relaxation from blue and calmness from purple. In an experiment by Adams and Osgood (1973), the most active color for a sample group was red, with the most passive colors, on the other hand, being black and gray.

Achromatic color shades are considered to be one-dimensional be-cause they lack two of the three essential qualities associated with col-or: hue and saturation. An achromatic color scheme contains only one di-mension—brightness—and in addition to the anchors of black and white, may include any of the shades that exist in between (Rock, 1975). Explor-ing achromatic colors (white, black, and gray), Wexner (1954) investigat-ed associations between color samples and words describing moods. In general, the results of that study tended to support the findings of other color-emotion association studies. In particular, red was found to be more strongly associated with the terms excitement and stimulation, implying a

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state of higher arousal. Blue was associated with the terms secure/comfort-able and tender/soothing, implying states of pleasantness and lower arous-al, while black was associated with the terms powerful/strong/masterful, im-plying a link with higher performance.

Studies dealing with psychological measures, as previously dis-cussed, have tended to show that red is “arousing,” and it has been ar-gued that the use of red in an interior space might tend to impair per-formance of activities requiring fine psychomotor coordination. Opposite effects were argued for blue and green, which were found to have “rest-ful” and “facilitating” effects (James & Domingos, 1953; Nakshian, 1964). Another study showed that blue colors especially evoke enhanced mood and calmness (Rosenstein, 1985; Stone, 2003). However, red and blue, as opposed to light blue and green, have been identified as increasing anxi-ety and nervousness (Kwallek, Lewis, & Robbins, 1988). By contrast with the above findings, some studies have found there to be no relationship between colors and mood (Ainsworth, Simpson, & Cassell, 1993; Kwallek, Lewis, Lin-Hsiao, & Woodson, 1996).

Given that heretofore there have been no studies gauging the differing effects on observers of warm, cool, and achromatic interior color schemes, and operating from the assumption that each of these color schemes will differently affect the perceptions of participants, the specific aim of the current study was to assess the visual preferences of participants with re-gard to warm, cool, and achromatic interior color schemes. Sex Effects

It is generally believed that people respond disparately to the envi-ronment in terms of their emotions. Furthermore, “gender researchers have attributed these differences to a variety of social and biological fac-tors” (Putrevu, 2003, p. 47). In terms of color preference and sex, Ou, Luo, Woodcock, and Wright (2004), for instance, compared the sexes with re-gard to 11 color-combination emotions. It was found that women observ-ers tended to respond “like” to color pairs that were “light,” “relaxed,” “feminine,” or “soft,” whereas this association was generally not observed for men’s responses. Boyatzis and Varghese (1994) found in another study that women showed particularly positive responses to brighter colors and negative responses to darker colors, whereas men were much more likely to have a positive emotional reaction to dark colors. In a study by Hemp-hill (1996), blue was the most favored color, followed closely by green and red, for both men and women. Gray was the least favored color for each group. On the other hand, women responded more positively than did men to bright colors (blue, green, red, yellow, white, purple, and pink) and also responded more negatively to dark colors (black, brown, and gray). In addition, some researchers have found that women tend to pre-


fer cool colors more than men, whereas men tend to prefer bright colors and stronger achromatic colors than women (McInnis & Shearer, 1964).

It has been argued that space is perceived more positively and objec-tively by men than by women. According to some literature on the topic, women appear to respond more subjectively, more sensitively, and in a more visually oriented manner than do men (Holbrook, 1986; Everhart, Shucard, Quatrin, & Shucard, 2001; Putrevu, 2003). Yildirim, Akalin-Bas-kaya, and Hidayetoglu (2007) have previously examined the effect of in-door color, sex, and age on the mood and cognitive performance of 250 participants, finding that men tended to evaluate the space more positive-ly compared to women participants. Hypotheses

The purpose of the study was to examine undergraduate students’ color-emotion associations in reference to three digital pictures of identi-cal living room views in three different color schemes in two different vir-tual living rooms: warm colors, cool colors, and achromatic colors (white, black, and gray). Warm colors were expected to elicit higher arousal, evok-ing feelings of stimulation, warmth, and excitement as compared to cool and achromatic colors (Hypothesis 1a). Cool colors, on the other hand, would elicit feelings of spaciousness, restfulness, calm, and peacefulness (Hypothesis 1b). In addition, achromatic colors would be the least highly rated on adjective scales as compared to warm and cool colors, eliciting only more feelings of calm and peacefulness as compared to warm colors (Hypothesis 1c).

Furthermore, in the color studies literature, there have been no stud-ies assessing the various effects on participants of warm, cool, and ach-romatic colors in different interiors. Much color research has been con-ducted using specific adjectives for mood tones, asking participants to associate these adjectives with a color. Maslow and Mintz (1956), Mintz (1956), Miwa and Hanyu (2002), and Yildirim, Akalin-Baskaya, and Hi-dayetoglu (2007) have found that light, color, accessories, and furniture have a significant effect on perceptual evaluations of a built environment. It has also been found that associations of certain mood tones with par-ticular colors are more apparent and precise than others (Wexner, 1954; Linton, 1999). With this in mind, it was expected that where spatial char-acteristics of interiors (i.e., furniture and decoration) vary, changes in col-or would evoke similar emotions independent of spatial characteristics, except in the case of responses associated with happiness and vividness (Hypothesis 2).

The present study was also designed to further explore the effects of sex as an important independent variable with regard to color perception. In particular, the task was to investigate emotional responses to an interior


space across varying color schemes. Men were expected to respond more positively than women to an interior space independent of color (Hy-pothesis 3); however, differently decorated living rooms in similar color schemes would evoke similar positive or negative responses in men and women (Hypothesis 4).

MethodParticipants

The data for the present study were obtained from face-to-face meet-ings between an interviewer and participants during a period of two weeks in 2009. Participants were selected from among undergraduate student volunteers from the Interior Architecture Departments of Selcuk and Hacettepe Universities in Turkey. The research was carried out in two stages, Exp. 1 and Exp. 2, each using the same questionnaire. A total of 290 interior architecture students participated in the two experiments (Selcuk University: 161; Hacettepe University: 129). A total of 150 students par-ticipated in Exp. 1, and 140 in Exp. 2. Each group had a similarly diverse distribution by sex, 66% women overall (Exp. 1: 67% women; Exp. 2: 65% women). All participants were between 18 and 24 years old. In the sub-sequent phase of the study, the data obtained from the participant pools from each of the two universities were merged.Measures

A single questionnaire was prepared for each of the two experiments consisting of two parts: the first asked for general information about the participants, and the second asked participants to record evaluations of the differently colored living rooms on each of 10 bipolar adjective pairs on a 7-point semantic differential scale anchored as follows: happy/unhap-py, spacious/less spacious, restful/disturbing, warm/cold, vivid/lackluster, high-ly arousing/not very arousing, exciting/unexciting, stimulating/nonstimulating, calm/restless, peaceful/nonpeaceful. The technique of altering the sets of items from positive to negative, as previously done by Berlyne (1974), Imamoglu (2000), Kaya and Weber (2003), and Yildirim, Akalin-Baskaya, and Hiday-etoglu (2007) was adopted to reduce the probability of participants simply marking the scale on either of the extremes. In compiling the initial list of items, the researchers tried not to be too specific, attempting rather to de-velop a list of general attributes that would fit the research subject.Procedures

For this study, digital images of two imaginary living rooms (virtual spaces) were used as the experimental setting. In Exp. 1, the living room included a corner window, two shelves on the wall, two coffee tables, an armchair, and a sofa. In Exp. 2, the living room had a glass door, floor lamp, coffee table, and an armchair. Exps. 1 and 2 were modeled using


the AutoCAD 2008 computer program, and a super-realistic view was ob-tained using 3DMax. For coloring, the Lab color space values were fixed in three different color schemes: cool, achromatic, and warm (Table 1). The virtual spaces’ lighting came predominantly from the natural light source of the window. Moreover, for general illumination, a standard light source was located in the middle of the space. Light levels of the experiments were set identically at 450 lux, and the color temperatures at 5,700 Kelvin. To enhance the reliability of the experiment, each of the experiment set-tings’ furniture and decoration were fixed, brightness and saturation were held constant and only the colors were changed (Fig. 1).

Witmer, Bailey, and Knerr (1996), Tlauka and Wilson (1996), Jansen-Osmann and Berendt (2002), and Jansen-Osmann (2002) studied the via-bility and advantages of using 2D screen-based virtual reality in research. These studies have emphasized that virtual spaces designed using com-puter programs can be created in a very short time, more economically,

TABLE 1Lab Color Space Values Applied in Virtual Interiors

Application Area Color Lab Color Space Values

L a b

Achromatic color (wall) Gray 40 0 0Cool color (wall) Blue 40 55 40Warm color (wall) Red 40 −55 −40Dark and light achromatic color (chair)* Gray 20/30 0/ 0 0/ 0Dark and light cool color (chair)* Blue 20/30 −40/−50 −30/−50Dark and light warm color (chair)* Red 20/30 40/ 50 30/ 50Dark and light achromatic color (carpet)* Gray 30/40 0/ 0 0/ 0Dark and light cool color (carpet)* Blue 25/50 −45/−50 −30/−50Dark and light warm color (carpet)* Red 25/50 40/ 50 30/ 50Note.—L: Lightness; a: Red/Green; b: Blue/Yellow. *Dark and light tones of the same color have been used in chair and carpet. Lab color space values of the dark and light tones have been demonstrated on the same cells.

Fig. 1. Digital picture examples of the living rooms in Exp. 1 and Exp. 2

Experiment 1 Experiment 2


and with less effort as compared to the use of real-world spaces. More-over, in comparing reactions to real-world places and virtual space sim-ulations, these studies found that virtual environments adequately rep-resented real-world complexity, and that values obtained for the virtual spaces were found to be almost identical to those obtained for real-world spaces. A recent meta-analysis by Stamps (2010) supports the validity of using virtual spaces to study reactions to architectural features.

For each of the experiments, detailed digital pictures of the three hy-pothetical living-room color schemes were shown to participants on a pro-jection screen. The projection device featured 1,024 × 768 resolution and brightness of 2,500 lumens, and the projected image was approximately 2 m × 1.4 m. Procedure

The participants were briefly introduced to the experiment at the be-ginning of the study, and they took approximately 15 min. to complete each of the questionnaires. Each experiment was conducted in sessions held at various times of the day, on weekdays. The second experiment was conducted a few weeks following the conclusion of the first. Analysis

Living room colors and participant’s sex were considered indepen-dent variables. In order to test the hypotheses, the two experiments used a model with a 3 × 2 factorial design, color scheme (warm, cool, achromat-ic) × sex (male, female). As in previous research (Yildirim, Akalin-Baskaya, & Celebi, 2007), Cronbach’s alpha coefficients of the dependent variables were calculated and a correlation test was used to assess if there were re-lationships between the dependent variables. Afterwards, the categorical means of the data were derived along with their standard deviations and their alignment into homogeneous groups. Then, a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to examine the effects of differences in inte-rior design characteristics on the participants’ perceptions in the context of the living rooms. Subsequently, to examine the effects of the indepen-dent variables on the participants’ perception, the appropriate technique of multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was used. To compare the significant means of the variances in the analysis of variations, the data are shown in graphical form.

Results and DiscussionThe internal consistency reliability of the semantic differential scale,

including the adjective pairs, was tested using Cronbach’s alpha, the re-sults of which are reported in Table 2. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient for the set of 10 bipolar semantic differential items, including perceptual quality, was .92. The coefficient of the scale was above .70, the threshold for good


reliability according to some researchers (Bagozzi & Yi, 1988; Bosma, Mar-mot, Hemingway, Nicholson, Brunner, & Stansfield, 1997; Grewal, Krish-nan, Baker, & Borin, 1998). The scale may therefore be considered reliable.

In both experiments, the statistical relationships between the different color schemes of the virtual scenes (warm, cool, and achromatic) and par-ticipants’ perceptions of the environmental conditions were analyzed. The results of the research questionnaire are provided in Table 3 in terms of the mean, standard deviation, and alignment into homogeneous groups for each of the items under the dependent variables.

According to the results shown in Table 3, in both experiments (Exps. 1 and 2), the differences among participants’ perceptions of the three col-or schemes of the two virtual scenes were found to be statistically sig-nificant (at a level of p < .01) for all of the bipolar adjective pairs: “hap-py/unhappy” (F2,867 = 34.03, p < .001; η2 = 0.07), “spacious/less spacious” (F2,867 = 55.45, p < .001; η2 = 0.11), “restful/disturbing” (F2,867 = 23.48, p < .001; η2 = 0.05), “warm/cold” (F2,867 = 198.96, p < .001; η2 = 0.32), “vivid/lacklus-ter” (F2,867 = 138.85, p < .001; η2 = 0.24), “highly arousing/not very arousing” (F2,867 = 25.62, p < .001; η2 = 0.06), “exciting/unexciting” (F2,867 = 40.65, p < .001; η2 = 0.09), “stimulating/nonstimulating” (F2,867 = 154.56, p < .001; η2 = 0.26), “calm/restless” (F2,867 = 50.65, p < .001; η2 = 0.11), “peaceful/nonpeaceful” (F2,867 = 4.64, p < .01; η2 = 0.01). In addition, comparing responses between experiments, the differences in perceptual evaluations persisted, with the orientation of the participants’ perceptual evaluations for both exper-iments being parallel, whether positive or negative. The differences be-tween the participants’ evaluations of the various color schemes of the vir-tual interiors, including the perceptions of environmental conditions that evoked a positive perceptual response, are presented graphically in Fig. 2.

As seen in Fig. 2, differences in reported responses according to the independent variables (warm, cool, and achromatic colors) and the de-pendent variables (environmental conditions) have clearly emerged. It is

TABLE 2Cronbach’s Internal Consistency Reliability For Dependent Variables

Bipolar Item Cronbach’s alphahappy/unhappy .91spacious/less spacious .91restful/disturbing .91warm/cold .92vivid/lackluster .92highly arousing/not very arousing .91exciting/unexciting .91stimulating/nonstimulating .92calm/restless .92peaceful/nonpeaceful .92

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TABLE 3Means, Standard Deviations, and Homogeneous Group of Dependent Variables

Dependent Variable Exp. Evaluation (Ranking of Pictures)

Warm Cool Achromatic

M SD HG M SD HG M SD HG

happy/unhappy Exp. 1 3.11 1.96 A 3.71 1.64 B 4.52 1.85 CExp. 2 3.31 1.94 A 3.03 1.43 A 4.16 1.81 B

spacious/less spacious Exp. 1 3.45 1.93 A 3.24 1.90 A 4.73 1.72 BExp. 2 3.62 1.86 B 2.59 1.56 A 4.26 1.88 C

restful/disturbing Exp. 1 3.89 1.88 B 3.35 1.77 A 4.24 1.95 BExp. 2 3.69 1.86 B 2.86 1.67 A 4.05 1.94 B

warm/cold Exp. 1 2.03 1.64 A 4.69 1.87 B 4.97 1.81 BExp. 2 2.21 1.81 A 4.10 1.80 B 4.86 1.85 C

vivid/lackluster Exp. 1 2.45 1.40 A 3.06 1.70 B 4.89 1.77 CExp. 2 2.91 1.58 A 2.56 1.55 A 4.58 1.90 B

highly arousing/not very arousing Exp. 1 3.12 2.14 A 3.95 1.73 B 4.37 1.94 BExp. 2 3.22 2.05 A 3.47 1.64 A 4.25 1.97 B

exciting/unexciting Exp. 1 3.27 2.08 A 4.15 1.60 B 4.73 1.88 CExp. 2 3.36 1.96 A 4.10 1.69 B 4.64 1.81 C

stimulating/nonstimulating Exp. 1 2.47 1.71 A 4.17 1.72 B 5.13 1.69 CExp. 2 2.84 1.70 A 4.11 1.59 B 4.98 1.58 C

calm/restless Exp. 1 4.81 1.72 C 3.36 1.82 A 4.15 1.89 BExp. 2 4.66 1.70 C 3.10 1.72 A 4.10 2.00 B

peaceful/nonpeaceful Exp. 1 3.63 1.76 C 3.35 1.72 A 3.43 1.83 AExp. 2 3.98 1.61 C 3.38 1.67 A 3.89 1.75 B

Note.—Mean ratings ranged from 1 to 7, with higher numbers representing more negative responses.


generally understood that warm colors are associated with higher arous-al, evoking more stimulating and exciting emotions as compared to cool and achromatic colors. The cool colors, on the other hand, are thought to produce feelings of spaciousness, restfulness, calm, and peacefulness as compared to the warmer colors. The present results support the first hypothesis of the study and are in accord with the findings of previous research (e.g., Nelson, et al., 1984; Crowley, 1993; Kaya & Crosby, 2006; Manav, 2007). In addition, achromatic color interiors were evaluated more negatively for all the bipolar items except those related to feelings of calm and peacefulness.

The results show that the perceptions of each of the three different color schemes of the two virtual interiors were statistically different with regard to the perceptual quality variables concerning high arousal, stimu-lation, and excitement, ranging in order from most positive to most nega-tive as follows: warm color interior > cool color interior > achromatic color interior. The evocation of feelings of spaciousness and restfulness differed by color scheme as well, ranging in order from most positive to most nega-tive as follows: cool color interior > warm color interior > achromatic color interior. In terms of their propensity to elicit feelings of calm and peaceful-ness, the various color schemes ranged in order from most positive to most negative as follows: cool color interior > achromatic color interior > warm color interior. Lastly, feelings of happiness and vividness as elicited by each of the color schemes ranged from most positive to most negative in Exp. 1 as follows: warm color interior > cool color interior > achromatic col-or interior, and in Exp. 2 as follows: cool color interior > warm color inte-

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happy/unhappy

5.5

4.8

4.1

3.4

2.7

2.0warm/ cold

vivid/ lackluster

high arousal/ not very arousing

exciting/unexciting

stimulating/nonstimulating

peaceful/nonpeace

ful

calm/ restless

restful/ disturbing

spacious/ less spacious

Fig. 2. Effects of virtual interior color schemes on dependent variables. Means ranged from 1 to 7, with higher numbers representing more negative responses. Exp. 1 Warm ( ); Exp. 1 Cool ( ); Exp. 1 Achromatic ( ); Exp. 2 Warm ( ); Exp. 2 Cool ( ); Exp. 2 Achromatic ( ).


rior > achromatic color interior. Thus, it can be safely argued that when the location of similar color schemes does not change but other spatial char-acteristics (i.e., furniture and decoration) do change, the nature (positive/negative) of the perceptual effect of color schemes on users persists. This result, which supports the second hypothesis of the study, clearly indi-cates that color has a predominant effect on interior design factors as com-pared to other considerations.

For both experiments, the response differences between the sexes were analyzed for each of the three digital pictures of the same view ren-dered with warm, cool, and achromatic colors (Table 4). For each of the dependent variables, male participants reported lower values (i.e., more positive responses) while female participants reported higher values (i.e., more negative responses) for both of the brightly colored interiors (warm and cool colors). The values for the achromatic interior, however, were similar for both sexes. It must be noted that female participants respond-ed more negatively to both warm and cool colors. For both male and fe-male participants, responses to color schemes varied from most positive to most negative in the following order: warm > cool > achromatic. Thus, there seems to be statistically meaningful differences between the sexes in terms of their perception of environmental conditions. Therefore, based on the results regarding the effect of sex on participants’ perceptions of environmental conditions, the hypothesis that differences would be ob-served is supported.

TABLE 4Means and Standard Deviations of Ratings by Sex, of Living Room Color

Participant’s Sex Color

Warm Cool Achromatic

M SD M SD M SD

Male 2.84 1.06 3.16 1.00 4.35 1.40Female 3.52 1.47 3.70 1.25 4.49 1.47Note.—Means ranged from 1 to 7, with higher numbers representing more negative responses.

The effects of any interaction between the independent variables (col-or and sex), depending on the participants’ perceptions of the environ-mental conditions for dependent variables, were tested using the MANO-VA. According to the results shown in Table 5, the main effects for color (F20,1712 = 50.62, p < .001) and participants’ sex (F10,855 = 4.198, p < .001) and the two-way interaction for color × sex (F20,1712 = 2.900, p < .001) were found to be significant. Thus, it may be said that for differences among warm/cool /achromatic living rooms, participants’ sex had an effect on perceptions of environmental conditions. More generally, it may be said that differences


among interior colors are important factors in the evaluation of environ-mental conditions.

Moreover, Yildirim, Akalin-Baskaya, and Hidayetoglu (2007) have ar-gued variance analyses demonstrate the reliability of the total scores on dependent variables. An examination of the F values derived from the table of variance analyses revealed that among all variables, the factor which most affected participants’ perceptions of the living rooms was col-or (F20,1712 = 50.618, p < .001). Differences in perceptions of the living rooms were also observed by sex (F10,855 = 4.198, p < .001). Although the two-way interaction for color × sex (F20,1712 = 2.900, p < .001) was found to be signifi-cant, it had a smaller effect on the perception of environmental conditions than the other two main factors. These results support the third hypoth-esis of the study, that male participants would respond more positively than female participants in terms of their perceptions of living room color schemes, and also the fourth hypothesis, that different living rooms with similar color schemes would be interpreted by men and women in a sim-ilar manner (positive or negative) but with different mean scores, even when the characteristics of the interiors changed.

The results of this research indicate that differences among the partici-pants’ perceptions of each of the three different interior color schemes with regard to environmental factors were statistically significant. Specifically, the warm color example tended to elicit more active feelings and the cool color example tended to be associated with responses having to do with feelings of calmness. For instance, warm colors were seen as stimulating, highly arousing, and exciting, while cool colors were associated with spa-ciousness, restfulness, and calm. This result supports the observations of Levy (1984), Nelson, et al. (1984), Whitfield and Wiltshire (1990), Mahnke (1996), Kaya and Crosby (2006), and Manav (2007), who have all suggest-ed that cool colors are relaxing, that they make interior spaces more peace-ful, and that they increase feelings of spaciousness, while warmer hues are more stimulating and make interior spaces seem less spacious.

For the achromatic color scheme, the responses were quite negative as compared to those for the warm and cool color schemes. As Hemp-hill (1996) has previously demonstrated, people react more positively to brighter colors (white, pink, red, yellow, blue, purple, and green) and more negatively to darker colors (brown, black, and gray). The findings

TABLE 5 MANOVA of Independent Variables

Independent Variable Wilks λ F df p η2

Living room color .743 50.62 20 < .001 0.37Sex .047 4.20 10 < .001 0.05Living room color × sex .066 2.90 20 < .001 0.03


of the present study also clearly present achromatic colors as being more associated with calm and peacefulness than warm colors. While the in-terior use of warm and cool colors was perceived positively, achromatic colors were perceived negatively, with the exception of measures of calm and peacefulness. Accordingly, if it is desired that interiors be seen as spa-cious, restful, calm, and peaceful, then cool colors should be used. On the other hand, if it is desired that interiors be seen as more arousing, exciting, and stimulating, then warm colors should be used.

Moreover, when the color scheme of a location does not change, and other spatial characteristics (i.e., furniture and decoration) do change, the perceptual effect of the colors in terms of positive and negative impact will be similar. Therefore, the way in which interior design factors affect dominant color clearly emerged as a priority to be addressed in terms of user satisfaction.

In comparisons of color-evoked emotions between sexes, the influ-ence of hue was generally found to be greater. Male participants tend-ed to report more positive perceptions than did female participants, with men perceiving brightly colored interiors more positively than dark in-teriors. This result supports the findings of McInnis and Shearer (1964), who also found that men preferred brighter and more strongly chromat-ic colors, more so than did women. The result here also supports Cheng’s findings (2001) that red and yellow with high chroma were generally re-garded by men as “warm” and “dynamic,” whereas green and blue col-ors were considered “cool” and “passive.” In the present study, male par-ticipants reported more positive responses for both the warm and the cool color schemes. However, with regard to the achromatic color schemes, no statistically significant difference was found between the sexes. Further research is required to examine this color contradiction, how different sat-urations and brightnesses of warm, cool, and achromatic colors are asso-ciated with positive and negative emotional responses for various spatial settings.

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Accepted March 8, 2011.