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The Perception on Color.“You may be surprised to learn that color is not a property of objects—it is a property of us” (Feist, G & Rosenberg, E, 2012, page 145, para 3). To me, this quote says that color is not just something you see on something like a crayon but something that is inside of us and something that we all give a meaning to. Color is something we use to represent things. Perception of color starts at an early age. It is drilled into our minds that certain colors represent certain emotions or circumstances. As children, we see the world full of wonders and colors with our minds as curious as ever. Color shapes our perception as we grow; from children just seeing colors as colors and as we grow, we begin to give colors more meaning then they should. I decided that I was going to ask 4 children (about the ages of 3 and 4) and 4 adults (closest to the age of 18) about what three specific colors meant to them. These colors are the three primary colors; red, yellow, and blue. I asked the children and the adults around the same questions. I made the questions somewhat simple. Mostly for the children but because sometimes it is hard to think back to your childhood and remember certain things that popped out with a certain color attachment. I started at a small daycare in my hometown and took 4 kids that I already knew and knew that the kids know their colors. The first kid I asked questions was a 4 year old named Sophia.Q: Is yellow the happy, sad, or mad color?A: “A good, happy color.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Yellow, like banana peels. It’s my favorite color. It’s pretty.”Q: Is red happy, sad, or mad?A: “It’s a good color.”Q: What does the color red remind you of?A: “When you have a red, mad face and lipstick. It’s my favorite color too.”Q: Is blue happy, sad, or mad?A: “Happy.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Just blue.”Then she went on to saying that the color white is mad because it is scary like a really white face or ghost. Happy colors are colors like red, orange, and yellow. A sad color in her opinion is orange.The second kid I questioned was a little boy named Bradley who was 3 years old.Q: Is yellow the happy, sad, or mad color?A: “A mad color.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Umm I don’t know, yellow.”Q: Is red happy, sad, or mad?A: “Umm, Mad.”Q: What does the color red remind you of?A: “A big red face.”Q: Is blue happy, sad, or mad?A: “Mad.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: He could not think of anything. He didn’t tell me which colors he thought were mad or sad but he did say that the color pink is a happy color.The third kid I questioned was a little girl named Pheobe.Q: Is yellow the happy, sad, or mad color?A: “Mad.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Nothing.”Q: Is red happy, sad, or mad?A: “Mad.”Q: What does the color red remind you of?A: “Nothing.”Q: Is blue happy, sad, or mad?A: “Sad.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “The sky.”She went on to say a happy color is pink, a mad color is red, and a sad color is black. When I asked why she thought the color black was a sad color she replied to me to say that it was because that it missed her mommy.The fourth kid I questioned was a 4 year old boy named Walker.Q: Is yellow the happy, sad, or mad color?A: “A happy color.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Ducks and flowers and books.”Q: Is red happy, sad, or mad?A: “A happy color.”Q: What does the color red remind you of?A: “A red and happy face.”Q: Is blue happy, sad, or mad?A: “Happy.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Nothing.”Walker told me that happy colors are; green, pink, purple, orange, and yellow. A mad color to Walker is silver because he doesn’t like the color. A sad color to him is white because he doesn’t like that color either.In my opinion, Children don’t realize what colors can represent yet. This is understandable because they are young but at what age does this start to change. What things start to stand out in a child’s mind that make them think that certain colors make you feel a certain way or remind you of certain things. Trying to figure this out I interviewed an 8 year old named Grace trying to find her point of view on the matter.Q: Is yellow the happy, sad, or mad color?A: “Mad”Q: Why?A: “Sometimes I think of the color yellow when I’m mad.” Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “This color reminds me of a sunflower and a yellow banana.”Q: Is red happy, sad, or mad?A: “Mad.”Q: Why?A: “Because whenever your face turns red, that means you’re mad.” Q: What does the color red remind you of?A: “A red apple and a rose.”Q: Is blue happy, sad, or mad?A: “Sad.”Q: Why?A: Because whenever you cry, blue tears come out of your eyes.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Reminds me of the beautiful sea.”Grace thinks that some happy colors are; green, pink, and yellow. Some mad colors are; red, black, brown, and purple. Some sad colors are; blue, peach, and gray. I feel that as you are growing up you see things that represent colors in certain ways. A good example of this is a red face which mostly resemble a mad face like Grace said, “Because whenever your face turns red, that means you’re mad.” Another example is blue tears. As I will mention later when I question 18 year olds, you see people in cartoon crying blue tears or when you draw a picture of somebody crying, you tend to draw the tears with the color blue.The next age group that I questioned was 13 year olds. I interviewed a boy named Tim first.Q: Is yellow the happy, sad, or mad color?A: “Happy.”Q: Why?A: “Because It is bright and the color of the sun.” Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “The sun.”Q: Is red happy, sad, or mad?A: “Mad.”Q: Why?A: “Because when you’re mad, your face tends to get red.” Q: What does the color red remind you of?A: “A tomato.”Q: Is blue happy, sad, or mad?A: “sad.”Q: Why?A: “The sky is blue and when you are feeling blue, you are feeling down.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Rain.”I then started to ask the same questions to a group of adults. All at the age of 18.Tam:Q: Is yellow the happy, sad, or mad color?A: “Happy.”Q: Why?A: “Because Asians are yellow and yellow is happy.” Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Pac-man.”Q: Is red happy, sad, or mad?A: “Mad.”Q: Why?A: “Red symbolizes anger. Red is heat and hot is anger.” Q: What does the color red remind you of?A: “Anger, punching, gritting your teeth, and fighting.”Q: Is blue happy, sad, or mad?A: “Sad.”Q: Why?A: “When I think of blue, I think of water and then I think of tears.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “That the sky is blue, water, rain, and being gloomy.”Q: What childhood memories do you have with these colors?A:Yellow: “Pac-man was yellow and happy.”Red: “Red lights.”Blue: “How I almost drowned when I was younger.”Q: What other emotions do you think that these colors represent?A:Yellow: Happiness.Red: “Angry.”Blue: “Tranquil, calm, and peaceful.”Omar:Q: Is yellow the happy, sad, or mad color?A: “Happy.”Q: Why?A: “I don’t really know. It is bright and just is happy.” Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “The sun, cheese, pre-caution tape, minions, police, my childhood home was yellow, and kid idols like big bird and PJ from Barney, and bright lights.”Q: Is red happy, sad, or mad?A: “Mad.”Q: Why?A: “It is normally represented with bad things.” Q: What does the color red remind you of?A: “Stop signs, angry people, women in red sexy dresses, romance, alerts, being wrong, cartoon with red faces which is because the blood rushes to your face because you are mad, and blood.”Q: Is blue happy, sad, or mad?A: “Sad.”Q: Why?A: “Because tears are normally blue.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Tears and the water.”Q: What childhood memories do you have with these colors?A:Yellow: “Big bird was yellow on Sesame Street and on Barney, there was a yellow dinosaur.”Red: “Cartoon faces were always red when they were mad and red traffic lights.”Blue: “Cartoon tears were always blue and when I got #1 ribbons, those were blue too.”Q: What other emotions do you think that these colors represent?A:Yellow: “Happy and caution.”Red: “Sexy, sensual, wrong, or alerts.”Blue: “Tranquility.”Catherine:Q: Is yellow the happy, sad, or mad color?A: “Happy.”Q: Why?A: “Yellow is bright and cheery.” Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “The sun and light.”Q: Is red happy, sad, or mad?A: “Mad.”Q: Why?A: “It is just perceived as angry.” Q: What does the color red remind you of?A: “Fire and when a face turns red then it is perceived as mad”Q: Is blue happy, sad, or mad?A: “Sad”Q: Why?A: “I always see cartoon tears blue and the water is blue and calm which makes me feel that way.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Cartoon tears and the water.”Q: What childhood memories do you have with these colors?A:Yellow: “My grandmother used to have chickens and baby chicks are yellow and cute and chicks are happy.”Red: “Nothing specific.”Blue: “Me and my older brother were playing soccer one day and found a dead blue robin on the ground.”Q: What other emotions do you think that these colors represent?A:Yellow: “Just happiness.”Red: “Anger and passion.”Blue: “Sadness and calmness.”Ranjana:Q: Is yellow the happy, sad, or mad color?A: “Happy.”Q: Why?A: “Because it is exciting and bright.” Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “sunflowers and the sun.”Q: Is red happy, sad, or mad?A: “Mad.”Q: Why?A: “Because I always saw it representing anger.” Q: What does the color red remind you of?A: “Strawberries and blood.”Q: Is blue happy, sad, or mad?A: “Sad.”Q: Why?A: “Not sure why.”Q: What does this color remind you of?A: “Tears in cartoons, blueberries, water, tumblr, and going to the beach.”Q: What childhood memories do you have with these colors?A:Yellow: “Drawing yellow suns and drawing big smiley faces on them and sunglasses.”Red: “Nothing.”Blue: “Blue tears from cartoons.”Q: What other emotions do you think that these colors represent?A:Yellow: “Excited and happy.”Red: “Passion, lust, and love.”Blue: “Sadness and calmness.”The four adults seem to all have the same idea in mind and have a lot of the same representations throughout their childhoods. For example, the blue tears and the red faces in cartoons. Even in my own childhood, I saw the same things. The perception of color is within ourselves and we make it what we want to but there are those certain things that help us shape these beliefs of color. Children don’t see these connections yet but I think as they grow, they will. They only see colors as colors and nothing really past that. The adults can easily see more connections to the color red though, like matching different emotions to the color, like passion, lust, evil, etc. I am also 18 years old and I somewhat see the same things as the other 18 year old. Although I could add the devil, evil, drawing red hearts, and scary red eyes to the red section. To the color yellow, there is not much I can really add, I find that there is no other emotion that best suits to yellow other than happiness. Blue is also another one where is can have a few other meanings, like sad, calm, relaxed, and gentle, yet I find that I can’t really add much else to that. The children have this open and wide mind that lets them see colors as color but also without meaning. By this, I mean they don’t have to fit a stereotype to a specific color. Why does the color blue have to mean sad, the sky is not sad so why can’t blue be a happy color? The only downside to this is that children don’t see that these colors can symbolize bad things or alert. Examples of this are: A red stop sign, yellow caution tape, word written in a bloody red, and evil red eyes (this one might already say to them that it is bad). There are objects that match up with the color to teach us how to fit the color and meaning together. Some examples of this are: stop signs-red, cartoon tears-blue, devil-red, angry faces- red, calm waters- blue, bright lights- yellow. The perception of color is not only within us but caused by society and the simple things around us.Reference:Feist, Gregory & Rosenberg, Erika (2012). General Psychology, Perspectives and Connections, Second Edition. Page 145, Paragraph 3 “The Perception of Color.” ................
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