The Effect of Classroom Red Walls on the Students’ Aggression

Abstract

Background: Color is one of the most important physical features of the environment that affects the architectural quality of space, behavior, and human feelings. Objectives: This study was conducted to investigate the effect of classroom red walls on the aggression of female high school students. Methods: The sample size in this study included 70 female high school students studying in Shiraz, Iran, during the academic year of 2017 to 2018. The research sample was obtained using cluster random sampling. In this way, one area was selected randomly from four educational districts of Shiraz. Then, one school was selected randomly from all female high schools in a selected district. Classes were randomly divided to two groups of 35 students, control and intervention group, among all the school classrooms. At first, a pre-test including Buss and Perry aggression questionnaire was performed. Then, the classroom walls of the intervention group were painted red. While the classroom walls of the control group were white. After 12 weeks, aggression tests were performed for each group. The means and standard deviations were used at descriptive level and analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was used at inferential level. Results: Pre-test and post-test score of aggression in the intervention group was 76.89 ± 25.494 and 101.00 ± 25.121. In the control group, the mean of pre-test and post-test were 79.54 ± 19.655 and 76.60 ± 19.820. The results of ANCOVA analysis showed that the classroom with red walls could significantly increase the level of aggression in general (P < 0.001) and its subscales, including verbal aggression (P < 0.001), physical aggression (P < 0.001), anger (P < 0.001), and hostility (P < 0.001). Conclusions: According to the results, red color of the classroom walls increased the aggression and its dimensions, including verbal aggression, physical aggression, anger, and hostility among female high school students.