TY - JOUR
T1 - Colour-emotion associations in individuals with red-green colour blindness
AU - Jonauskaite, Domicele
AU - Camenzind, Lucia
AU - Parraga, C. Alejandro
AU - Diouf, Cécile N.
AU - Ducommun, Mathieu Mercapide
AU - Müller, Lauriane
AU - Norberg, Mélanie
AU - Mohr, Christine
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 PeerJ Inc.. All rights reserved.
PY - 2021/4/7
Y1 - 2021/4/7
N2 - Colours and emotions are associated in languages and traditions. Some of us may convey sadness by saying feeling blue or by wearing black clothes at funerals. The first example is a conceptual experience of colour and the second example is an immediate perceptual experience of colour. To investigate whether one or the other type of experience more strongly drives colour-emotion associations, we tested 64 congenitally red-green colour-blind men and 66 non-colour-blind men. All participants associated 12 colours, presented as terms or patches, with 20 emotion concepts, and rated intensities of the associated emotions. We found that colour-blind and non-colour-blind men associated similar emotions with colours, irrespective of whether colours were conveyed via terms (r = .82) or patches (r = .80). The colour-emotion associations and the emotion intensities were not modulated by participants’ severity of colour blindness. Hinting at some additional, although minor, role of actual colour perception, the consistencies in associations for colour terms and patches were higher in non-colour-blind than colour-blind men. Together, these results suggest that colour-emotion associations in adults do not require immediate perceptual colour experiences, as conceptual experiences are sufficient.
AB - Colours and emotions are associated in languages and traditions. Some of us may convey sadness by saying feeling blue or by wearing black clothes at funerals. The first example is a conceptual experience of colour and the second example is an immediate perceptual experience of colour. To investigate whether one or the other type of experience more strongly drives colour-emotion associations, we tested 64 congenitally red-green colour-blind men and 66 non-colour-blind men. All participants associated 12 colours, presented as terms or patches, with 20 emotion concepts, and rated intensities of the associated emotions. We found that colour-blind and non-colour-blind men associated similar emotions with colours, irrespective of whether colours were conveyed via terms (r = .82) or patches (r = .80). The colour-emotion associations and the emotion intensities were not modulated by participants’ severity of colour blindness. Hinting at some additional, although minor, role of actual colour perception, the consistencies in associations for colour terms and patches were higher in non-colour-blind than colour-blind men. Together, these results suggest that colour-emotion associations in adults do not require immediate perceptual colour experiences, as conceptual experiences are sufficient.
KW - Affect
KW - Chromotherapy
KW - Colour cognition
KW - Colour vision deficiency
KW - Cross-modal correspondences
KW - Daltonism
KW - Deuteranopia
KW - Dichromatic
KW - Emotion
KW - Protanopia
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85104452954&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.7717/peerj.11180
DO - 10.7717/peerj.11180
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85104452954
SN - 2167-8359
VL - 9
JO - PeerJ
JF - PeerJ
M1 - e11180
ER -