The myth of Baker-Miller pink

Besides aesthetic aspects, color can have impact on human perception and behaviour. A special pink hue, the so called Baker-Miller pink, is assumed to induce calming effects. In this study, we evaluated pink and white lighting conditions with N = 29 subjects, through tests of attention, measurements of skin conductance and emotional state ratings. With an exposure time of 15 minutes including measurements, no color effect was found in skin conductance and attentional performance. There was also no difference in ratings of emotional valence and arousal between the two lighting conditions. Although, subjects rated Baker-Miller pink light significantly less activating than white light. A significant sex effect showed that women preferred pink light more than men. These results indicate that there are indeed differences in subjective perception of white and Baker-Miller pink light although they cannot be found in objective measures of physiological and cognitive processes.