Bosten14JOSAbfinalaccepted.pdf (1.56 MB)
Empirical evidence for unique hues?
Red, green, blue, yellow, and white have been distinguished from other hues as unique. We present results from two experiments that undermine existing behavioral evidence to separate the unique hues from other colors. In Experiment 1 we used hue scaling, which has often been used to support the existence of unique hues, but has never been attempted with a set of non-unique primaries. Subjects were assigned to one of two experimental conditions. In the "unique" condition, they rated the proportions of red, yellow, blue, and green that they perceived in each of a series of test stimuli. In the "intermediate" condition, they rated the proportions of teal, purple, orange, and lime. We found, surprisingly, that results from the two conditions were largely equivalent. In Experiment 2, we investigated the effect of instruction on subjects' settings of unique hues. We found that altering the color terms given in the instructions to include intermediate hues led to significant shifts in the hue that subjects identified as unique. The results of both experiments question subjects' abilities to identify certain hues as unique.
History
Publication status
- Published
File Version
- Accepted version
Journal
Journal of the Optical Society of America AISSN
1084-7529Publisher
Optical Society of AmericaExternal DOI
Issue
4Volume
31Article number
A385-A393Department affiliated with
- Psychology Publications
Full text available
- Yes
Peer reviewed?
- Yes
Legacy Posted Date
2015-01-28First Open Access (FOA) Date
2016-03-22First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date
2015-01-28Usage metrics
Categories
No categories selectedKeywords
Licence
Exports
RefWorks
BibTeX
Ref. manager
Endnote
DataCite
NLM
DC