Dear Senserely yours,
I am really interested in the topic of color. I am not really sure why, but I think there is something more to it than just making things look pretty. I hope HUE can help me understand more about color.
Senserely,
Rainbow Unicorn
Dear Rainbow Unicorn,
First of all, you are very much justified to be currently interested in color. Color is a topic of discourse with countless implications in different areas of our daily lives. In my opinion, however, our ability to perceive color is pretty much taken for granted. It is something we can only truly miss when it is suddenly taken from us. If you imagine living in a world without color, a world filled with grays and blacks of different intensities, then the true importance of color will begin to surface.
Color, although not necessary for survival, surely makes surviving a lot easier. First of all, it makes everything look vibrant and beautiful. Can you just imagine how sad it would be to watch a movie and not be able to appreciate that whole area of cinematography? Or to hike up a mountain and not fully experience the panoramic shot you are taking on your iphone? Indeed, color just adds that subtle kick which spices up our everyday lives.
Color, however, does not exist just for aesthetic purposes. Color does prove to have its significant roles in survival (we did evolve it so it must be there for something). Apparently, our perception of color helps us identify things much quicker. Danger, for example, can be indicated in the form of brightly colored snakes back in the days when we used to live in the jungle (UP lagoon can be considered a jungle) or the dreaded stop sign in the busy intersections of Metro Manila. Surely, the color of objects certainly help us avoid things which are dangerous.
In fact, color has been shown to aid in memory. It is pretty much common knowledge that green indicates go and red indicates stop in terms of traffic signals. Psychologists have pushed the semantics of these colors a bit further and attempted to relate them to memory and emotions. They paired certain words which are deemed to be emotionally positive or negative with either green or red. They also paired words which are considered to be emotionally neutral with green and red. It was shown from the study that the words paired with the colors were recalled better than the words without the color pairings. However, the more interesting point of this study was that the color red increased the probability of recall for words linked with negative emotion and the color green increased the probability of recall for words linked with positive emotions. Color, therefore, influences the recall of words linked with certain emotions. Of course, the influence of these colors is dependent on the weight these colors have on the culture of the population since different colors may connote different things for different cultures.
Another interesting study on color revealed the influence color has on identifying the emotions of different people. This study quite literally explored the figurative saying: "red with anger". It turns out, people can identify an angry facial expression much better when exposed to the color red. In fact, even when just slightly exposed to the color red the identification of the emotion anger already improves.
As you can see Rainbow Unicorn, there are several studies concerning color which are extremely interesting so being interested in this specific topic is nothing to be ashamed of. Can you just imagine what the future holds for color research. Future studies may even find that viewing specific colors may improve the immune system because of the positive emotions these colors convey!
Senserely yours,
Jan
References:
Kuhbandner, C., & Pekrun, R. (2013). Joint effects of emotion and color on memory. Emotion, 13(3), 375.
Young, S. G., Elliot, A. J., Feltman, R., & Ambady, N. (2013). Red enhances the processing of facial expressions of anger. Emotion, 13(3), 380.
I am really interested in the topic of color. I am not really sure why, but I think there is something more to it than just making things look pretty. I hope HUE can help me understand more about color.
Senserely,
Rainbow Unicorn
Dear Rainbow Unicorn,
First of all, you are very much justified to be currently interested in color. Color is a topic of discourse with countless implications in different areas of our daily lives. In my opinion, however, our ability to perceive color is pretty much taken for granted. It is something we can only truly miss when it is suddenly taken from us. If you imagine living in a world without color, a world filled with grays and blacks of different intensities, then the true importance of color will begin to surface.
Color, although not necessary for survival, surely makes surviving a lot easier. First of all, it makes everything look vibrant and beautiful. Can you just imagine how sad it would be to watch a movie and not be able to appreciate that whole area of cinematography? Or to hike up a mountain and not fully experience the panoramic shot you are taking on your iphone? Indeed, color just adds that subtle kick which spices up our everyday lives.
Color, however, does not exist just for aesthetic purposes. Color does prove to have its significant roles in survival (we did evolve it so it must be there for something). Apparently, our perception of color helps us identify things much quicker. Danger, for example, can be indicated in the form of brightly colored snakes back in the days when we used to live in the jungle (UP lagoon can be considered a jungle) or the dreaded stop sign in the busy intersections of Metro Manila. Surely, the color of objects certainly help us avoid things which are dangerous.
In fact, color has been shown to aid in memory. It is pretty much common knowledge that green indicates go and red indicates stop in terms of traffic signals. Psychologists have pushed the semantics of these colors a bit further and attempted to relate them to memory and emotions. They paired certain words which are deemed to be emotionally positive or negative with either green or red. They also paired words which are considered to be emotionally neutral with green and red. It was shown from the study that the words paired with the colors were recalled better than the words without the color pairings. However, the more interesting point of this study was that the color red increased the probability of recall for words linked with negative emotion and the color green increased the probability of recall for words linked with positive emotions. Color, therefore, influences the recall of words linked with certain emotions. Of course, the influence of these colors is dependent on the weight these colors have on the culture of the population since different colors may connote different things for different cultures.
Another interesting study on color revealed the influence color has on identifying the emotions of different people. This study quite literally explored the figurative saying: "red with anger". It turns out, people can identify an angry facial expression much better when exposed to the color red. In fact, even when just slightly exposed to the color red the identification of the emotion anger already improves.
As you can see Rainbow Unicorn, there are several studies concerning color which are extremely interesting so being interested in this specific topic is nothing to be ashamed of. Can you just imagine what the future holds for color research. Future studies may even find that viewing specific colors may improve the immune system because of the positive emotions these colors convey!
Senserely yours,
Jan
References:
Kuhbandner, C., & Pekrun, R. (2013). Joint effects of emotion and color on memory. Emotion, 13(3), 375.
Young, S. G., Elliot, A. J., Feltman, R., & Ambady, N. (2013). Red enhances the processing of facial expressions of anger. Emotion, 13(3), 380.
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