Samenvatting

Police interrogations tend to be very stressful which comes at the expense of the effectiveness of interrogations as stressed suspects and witnesses provide less extensive and accurate statements. To study the contribution of the interrogation room towards this problem, an experiment using the four-group design was performed. This experiment examined if wall colour and seating comfort have an impact on the level of stress, self-disclosure and accuracy of information of participants who took the role of witnesses. In a neutral room, stress levels of participants (N = 52) were measured, and their abilities to describe a suspect in quality (details) and quantity (time and amount of words). After moving to the experimental room, participants were facing a blue or red wall and were sitting on a comfortable chair or an uncomfortable stool. They performed a stress test and repeated the same measurements as in the neutral room by filling in a stress questionnaire and describing a suspect. Results showed no evidence that colour or seating comfort influences stress, self-disclosure or accuracy of information. Therefore can be concluded that interrogations are not being affected by wall colour and seating comfort. This is also applicable for other organisations as this study shows that users are not being affected by wall colour and seating comfort in terms of stress and disclosing information. However, although these conditions have no effect on performances the literature review and experiment indicate that colour affects mood of people. Future research is required to exclude other variables which might influence the effectiveness of police interrogations in the Netherlands or influence levels of stress and self-disclosure among users of a building.