It only ocurred to me today that the Brisbane City Council DRS officers have changed the colour of their shirts (like ages ago). These inforcers of local laws (i.e. parking inspectors, animal catchers, neighbour dispute solvers) are now in a light green collared shirt instead of their authoritative dark blue one. I immediately found them less “get out of my way – I’m so kickass” and more “hey, I’m your friendly neighbourhood parking friend – lets talk about your issues with disobeying rules”.
I wonder if that is the reason why they changed colour or whether it was just a special bargain a uniform company was offering. Lots of research has been done on the psychology of colours, and also on the impact of a uniform but I’m not entirely sure whether council has put *that* much thought in to it.
Colour influences so much of our lives without us noticing it. When scanning a fridge to decide what drink to buy, do you bother reading the text on a bright red and white can?
Do you know what the white headphones are connected to when they trail in to someone’s bag?
Did you know that some web developers actually think about their colour choices?
But what I want to know is…. what is the psychological effect of neon clothing?