Color–concept associations: A cross‐occupational and ‐cultural study and comparison

This study used a questionnaire survey to examine color–concept associations in two occupational groups from Hebei Province in China: steel workers (n = 139) and managerial staff (n = 74). The color stereotypes held by these two groups were also compared to those held by three other cultural groups studied elsewhere (Hong Kong Chinese, Yunnan Chinese, and Americans). The participants were presented with 16 concepts and asked to choose one of 10 colors to represent each concept. The chi‐square test results showed that each concept was significantly associated with at least one color. Both the steel workers and the managerial staff primarily associated green with “go” and “safe” and red with “stop” and “danger.” The cross‐group comparisons indicated that the steel workers and the managerial staff produced stronger color associations than those produced by the Yunnan Chinese and the Hong Kong Chinese subjects, but weaker than those produced by the US subjects. Our findings build on existing knowledge of population stereotypes for color–concept associations and provide guidelines for the design of color displays and products for global users. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Col Res Appl, 39, 630–635, 2014     

Color‐emotion associations,designing color schemes for urban environment‐architectural settings

Color in urban design has become an important issue, each city may present different colors which help to define and describe its architectural features. In the study, color in urban design with architectural setting is studied, façade colors are analyzed with a specific emphasis on the following research questions; “Can color schemes be designed in respect to color‐emotion associations? ” and “Are color‐emotion associations affective while designing architectural setting‐urban environment?.” Non‐color experts, 170 people, from different European and non‐European countries were asked to match the most appropriate adjectives with the given street views in accordance to their color schemes. In the first step, the effect of color is identified in relation to architectural environment‐urban setting, second the relative effect of color is studied as a component of the material. A categorical specification on color cognition and linguistic level of representation is attempted. The results can be a starting point to highlight the importance of preparing color schemes in regard to color‐emotion associations. Abstract color schemes may also provide us an idea about image setting, especially at design process stage. In the study, keywords are linked as environment‐response pairs; such as quiet, calming, lively, exclusive, reserved, and natural. Human psychophysical structure such as “warm‐cool,” “heavy‐light” in regard to visualizing certain colors are evaluated and described in terms of building materials.     

Proposal of an opponent‐colors system based on color‐appearance and color‐vision studies

A new theoretical color order system is proposed on the basis of various studies on color appearance and color vision. It has three orthogonal opponent‐colors axes and an improved chromatic strength of each hue. The system has color attributes whiteness w, blackness bk, grayness gr, chroma C, and hue H. A method is given for determining Munsell notations of any colors on any equi‐hue planes in the system. A method is also given for determining grayness regions and grayness values on hue‐chroma planes in the system. It is concluded that colors with the same color attributes [w, gr, bk, C] but with different hues in the theoretical space have approximately the same perceived lightness, the same degree of vividness (“azayakasa” in Japanese), and also the same color tone. The tone concept, for example used in the Practical Color Coordinate System (PCCS), is clarified perceptually. The proposed system is a basic and latent color‐order system to PCCS. In addition, the concept of veiling grayness by a pure color with any hue is introduced. Further, relationships are clarified between generalized chroma c(gen) and grayness. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Col Res Appl, 29, 135–150, 2004; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/col.10234     

Effects of hue,saturation, and brightness on color preference in social networks: Gender‐based color preference on the social networking site Twitter

Account information for over 1 million Twitter users was downloaded and analyzed to determine color preference. Blues were found to be the most preferred color, whereas greens were least preferred. Distinct gender‐specific differences were found. Males preferred blues to a greater extent than females, whereas females preferred magentas to a much greater extent than males. Males preferred darker colors to a greater extent than women. Density plots within hue, saturation, and brightness space summarize the distribution of color choices and illustrate color preferences for both males and females. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Col Res Appl, 38, 196–202, 2013.     

A cross‐cultural clustering study of similarities and dissimilarities based on concept words cheap,reliable, and high quality and their corresponding color associations

The world has undergone a techno‐cultural revolution during the last decades with the materialization of the “global village” and more; all having a profound impact on our culture. Quantitative analysis of these profound multidimensional changes needs cross‐cultural data, and scalable tools/techniques that can discover interesting nontrivial hidden relationships in large data sets. Subsequently, presenting these discovered relationships in an intuitive visual form to non‐IT domain experts. In this article, using proven data mining techniques, we perform cross‐cultural clustering of word‐color associations for 344 respondents from three cultures, that is, the United States, Pakistan, and Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. We consider the concept words cheap, reliable, and high quality along with colors liked and disliked for 10 colors. After statistical data validation one‐way cross‐cultural clustering was performed. High similarity of word‐based cluster association was discovered across the three cultures for negative and positive connotation words, and clear dissimilarity in clustering was discovered within each culture for color‐based cluster association; with possible explanations given. The universal consistent similarities in cross‐culture associations and the dissimilarities in local or intra‐culture associations could be useful for global brand decision making. In this article, we also do a technical comparison of the proposed technique with three traditional techniques used for such analysis, that is, hierarchical clustering, k‐means clustering and factor analysis; along with related comparison with principal component analysis and multidimensional scaling.