No Yellow Walls in Childcare Settings!

"I love my daycare space! It's bright and happy with a sunny yellow color on the walls."

My response to my provider friend: an internal, "NOOOOOooooooo!"

There’s a reason you never see yellow in an airplane.

Take a good long look at the above block of yellow. Does it make you feel dizzy after a moment? Maybe even a little nauseated? If so, you’re in good company. A number of studies have shown that the color yellow can cause dizziness and nausea. For this reason, it’s often used sparingly (or very strategically) by those in advertising, and is almost never used in the interiors of various forms of transportation — most notably, airplanes.

https://www.onlinepsychologydegree.info/psychology-color/

Also hospitals, nursing homes, and....childcare settings.

I happen to be one of those people. The color yellow makes me physically ill. There's conjecture that something harmful that was the color yellow caused anxiety in my ancestors to the point that it altered our DNA to see the CAUTION sign of yellow. Possibly hornets or nightshade flowers. When we see it, we are thinking of danger, flight/fight, self-preservation, and our nervous systems go into panic mode. 

Since it is a genetic thing, there's no turning it off. 

The last thing you want is to have children in an internal panic the moment they walk into a room. You may not understand their reaction, they definitely don't. If you don't know that yellow can be a triggering color, you may never consider that a child had that genetic component, and instead chock the accompanying behavior to separation anxiety, non-compliance, just an ornery child, or other non-related contribution.

After talking to my friend about this phenomenon, she agreed that in looking back, there were definitely some children who showed signs of this trait. She just hadn't known. Her walls are no longer a "sunny yellow." She keeps that color for her personal space, since she loves it.