The effect of classroom wall color on learning performance: A virtual reality experiment

The wall color has the certain impact on the learning performance of college students in the classroom. To find the suitable wall color to improve the learning performance, this study used the virtual reality (VR) technology to build five virtual classrooms with yellow, red, white, blue, and green walls, while the subjective evaluation and objective physiological indicators of college students were collected. The subjective survey showed the cold-colored walls such as blue and green had the highest levels of relaxation and pleasure, while the warm-colored walls such as yellow and red had the better attention and learning performance. And the white-walled classroom had the lowest subjective evaluation and the worst learning performance, but the white wall was widely used in the present class room. Physiological test results showed the yellow wall had the higher HRV-nLF/nHF and low-β & high-β frequencies in the FP2 channel in the frontal, but the white wall had the lowest scores. Moreover, the correlation analysis had confirmed electroencephalography (EEG) and electrocardiogram (ECG) indicators could be employed to evaluate the learning performance. These findings provide an effective reference for the spatial design of university classrooms and a basis for the study of physiological indicators.