How does colour affect our brain?
Contents:
1. Introduction
2. How do we see colour?
a. General
b. The eye
c. The science behind colour
3. Seeing colours
4. The science behind colour and emotion
a. Colour and intuition
5. Does colour affect decision making?
a. Logo colours
6. Conclusion
Introduction
Our everyday decisions are based on our likes and dislikes, the colour of the product, and the style of the product. But how does something so small thing like colour affect how much we may want the item. We learn about light and colour in physics and art but how it impacts our brain and our thoughts is something we never get to learn about. Combining basic physics, art and psychology we can find the answer to why different colours have different impacts and how the different impacts may boost economic activity of various different companies.
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Before we can understand the impacts of colour we must first have a basic understanding of how our brain sees colour.
General
The yellow is not in the banana. It’s the surface of the banana that reflects the wave lengths that we see as yellow. An item will appear white if it reflects all the white lengths but if it absorbs all the wavelengths it will appear as black. Red, green and blue are the primary colours of the spectrum and by combining different amounts of these colours can we produce the various different colours we see today. (Pantone, how do we see colour, 2016)
The Eye
The retina is covered in cells shaped like rods and cones. The cones are sensitive to colour and they respond to different wavelengths, long, medium and short. The cones work together to give information to the brain and to name the colours. Rods are more sensitive to dim light. It is rods that help you adjust to a darkened room when you enter. That is why you lose most of your coloured vision when you enter a dark room.
Seeing
Professor Fisher, in 2004, said that color affects human beings in many ways, on both the conscious and subconscious levels, every day of our lives. As Professor Fisher stated, color affects us so many times a day, that often times we don’t even realized it’s happening. Think about all the things you have done today, that in someway involved color. For example, think of a stoplight and what each color on it means; without those colors we would not have the technology of a stoplight and therefore our everyday driving wouldn’t be quite as easy.
The primary colors like red, yellow, and blue tend to emphasize simplicity as well as speed. The secondary colors are created by mixing two primary colors together. These colors include green, orange and purple. The tertiary colors can be created by mixing secondary and primary colors together. If they want to manipulate the consumers, the advertisers are mixing the images and colors together in such a way that can persuade and direct the consumers to purchase the product by deceiving and misleading them.
When a beam of sunlight passes through a specially shaped glass object called a prism, the rays of different wavelengths are bent at different angles. The bending breaks up the sunlight into a beautiful band of colors. This band contains all the colors of the rainbow and is called the visible spectrum. At one end of the spectrum, the light appears as violet. It consists of the shortest wavelengths of light that we can see. Farther along the spectrum, the light has increasingly longer wavelengths. It appears as blue, green, yellow, orange, and red, each shading into its neighboring colors in the spectrum. The longest wavelengths of light that we can see appear deep red in color. Some descriptions of the spectrum also mention the color indigo, which is closely related to blue, between violet and blue.
It is a wonderful thing to witness a sunset and see all the various colors that occur in our world. What would it be like if we didn’t view the sunset with all the beautiful colors that are perceived in it? According to Brown, Lindsey, Mcsweeney, and Walters, (1994) without factoring in brightness, newborn infants cannot differentiate between colors. This was found by testing infants in forced-choice preferential looking experiments or FPL experiments (Brown et al., 1994). It is astonishing to think that we haven’t always viewed the world in various vibrant colors. So at what point do we as individuals develop full color
The eyeball holds many parts to allow eyesight. The retina holds the key to allowing the human eye to see color. The pupil appears as the black part of the eye that people see, the pupil however does not have much to do with comprehending color. As Clarence Rainwater said in his book “The pupil is simply the hole in the iris through which light enters the eye.” (84) The light then has to pass through many parts of the eye before reaching the retina such as the transparent cornea, the aqueous humor, the lens, and the vitreous humor. Clarence Rainwater described the retina as “... the eye’s sensitive inner surface.” (86) The exciting part of the eye starts here. The retina holds the key as stated by Clarence Rainwater, “... a complex system
things can be identified by color, so seeing things in black and white can lead to immense
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How do Colors directly impact our feelings, mood, and decisions? This paper is a research paper that is supported by Metro State University’s electronic library, in how Color psychology and light therapy together can affect neurological functioning. It will inform the reader that colors and light affect our subconscious responses that happen while being exposed to that color.
Humans have three cone cells that are extremely sensitive to Red, (620-700nm), Green (490-570nm) and Blue (450-495nm) wavelengths of light. Although these three cones are most sensitive to these wavelengths, they are still sensitive to the remaining wavelengths of visible light between 400-700nm. When a light with a wavelength of 600nm is transmitted through the retina, the Red and Green cones capture, sense and signal the brain that orange light is observed. In this case the Red and Green cones absorb light but the Green cones are less sensitive. Also, the Blue cones don’t absorb much light and are not sensitive
Most colors within the visible light spectrum hold specific emotions that are conveyed to individuals by artists through their pieces of art. Van Gogh carefully incorporated both vibrant and dark colors in his iconic painting Café Terrace at Night, of which span across a vast array of emotions. One of the colors that stand out when you first observe the painting is the vibrant yellow used for the exterior of the café. The color yellow is known within the art community as a cheerful and warm color, helping the café to come across as an inviting gathering place to the individuals observing the painting. Another color that Van Gogh used which quickly grabs
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Strictly speaking, blue is nothing but light that is reflected off the surface of an object and into receivers. These receivers then send electrical impulses to the brain that then interprets the impulses as blue. In that case, what more is color other than the interpretation of electrical signals? Without the stimuli and the receiver, there would be no color. In that case, color is only defined by the measurement of something else. A scientific approach to seeing color reveals a puzzling explanation.
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Based on the findings that one has discovered in life itself, in essence, color helps with the flows of life in a way that it can determines your thoughts, emotions, and decisions. In my research I gained a vast amount knowledge and from what I’ve learned; now I can explain colors in depth, with a great amount of detail. If colors were non-existent, then, there would be a very grey look upon life. Colors brings forth light, and the light brings forth living. The world displays colors for a reason and it’s very important to life.