Cover not available

In:Progress in Colour Studies: Cognition, language and beyond
Edited by Lindsay W. MacDonald, Carole P. Biggam and Galina V. Paramei
[Not in series 217] 2018
► pp. 120–135

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload Book PDF
authorization required

Chapter 6
A Color Inference Framework

 | University of Wisconsin – Madison, USA
Published online: 26 November 2018
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/z.217.06sch
Abstract
As people interact with the world, they form associations between colors and concepts. These color-concept associations are dynamic: they continually update with new experiences, and they vary in relevance depending on contextual cues. In this chapter, I present the Color Inference Framework, a functional system, to describe how people form conceptual inferences from color information (color inferences) and how those inferences influence people’s judgements about the world. Within the Color Inference Framework, I define three kinds of cognitive operations – pooling, transmitting, and assigning – that act on the same mental representation (color-concept association network) to produce different kinds of evaluative and interpretive judgements. I also discuss empirical evidence in support of the Color Inference Framework.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The Color Inference Framework
    • 2.1Input: Perceptual and conceptual context
    • 2.2Color-concept association network
    • 2.3Operations and output
      • 2.3.1Pooling to produce evaluations of colors
      • 2.3.2Transmitting to produce evaluations of concepts
      • 2.3.3Assigning to produce interpretations about color-concept mappings
  • 3.Summary and conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
References (31)
References
Dael, Nele, Marie-Noëlle Perseguers, Cynthia Marchand, Jean-Philippe Antonietti, and Christine Mohr. 2016. “Put on That Colour, It Fits Your Emotion: Colour Appropriateness as a Function of Expressed Emotion.” The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 69: 1619–1630. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Elliot, Andrew J., and Markus A. Maier. 2012. “Color-in-Context Theory.” Advances in Experimental Social Psychology 45: 63–125. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Gattis, Merideth, and Keith J. Holyoak. 1996. “Mapping Conceptual to Spatial Relations in Visual Reasoning.” Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition 22: 231–239. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hård, A., and L. Sivik. 1981. “NCS–Natural Color System: A Swedish Standard for Color Notation.” Color Research & Application 6: 129–138. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Havasi, Catherine, Robert Speer, and Justin Holmgren. 2010. “Automated Color Selection Using Semantic Knowledge.” Commonsense Knowledge: Proceedings of the AAAI Fall Symposium (FS-10-02), 40–45. [URL]
Holyoak, Keith J., and Robert G. Morrison. 2012. “Thinking and Reasoning: A Reader’s Guide.” In Oxford Handbook of Thinking and Reasoning, ed. by Keith J. Holyoak and Robert G. Morrison, 14–24. New York: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Humphrey, Nicholas. 1976. “The Colour Currency of Nature.” In Colour for Architecture, ed. by T. Porter and B. Mikellides, 95–98. London: Studio-Vista.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jahanian, Ali, Shaiyan Keshvari, S. V. N. Vishwanathan, and Jan P. Allebach. 2017. “Colors–Messengers of Concepts: Visual Design Mining for Learning Color Semantics.” ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction 24:2:1. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lin, Sharon, Julie Fortuna, Chinmay Kulkarni, Maureen Stone, and Jeffrey Heer. 2013. “Selecting Semantically-Resonant Colors for Data Visualization.” Computer Graphics Forum 32: 401–410. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Munsell, Albert Henry. 1966. Munsell Book of Color: Glossy Finish Collection. Baltimore: Munsell Color Company.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Osgood, Charles E., George J. Suci, and Percy H. Tannenbaum. 1957. The Measurement of Meaning. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ou, Li-Chen, M. Ronnier Luo, Andrée Woodcock, and Angela Wright. 2004. “A Study of Colour Emotion and Colour Preference. Part I: Colour Emotions for Single Colours.” Color Research & Application 29: 232–240. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Palmer, Stephen E., and Karen B. Schloss. 2010. “An Ecological Valence Theory of Human Color Preference.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the U.S.A. 107: 8877–8882. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schloss, Karen B., Daniel Hawthorne-Madell, and Stephen E. Palmer. 2015. “Ecological Influences on Individual Differences in Color Preference.” Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics 77: 2803–2816. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schloss, Karen B., and Isobel A. Heck. 2017. “Seasonal Changes in Color Preferences Are Linked to Variations in Environmental Colors: A Longitudinal Study of Fall.” i-Perception 8(6): 1–19. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schloss, Karen B., Laurent Lessard, Charlotte S. Walmsley, and Kathleen Foley. 2018. “Color Inference in Visual Communication: Interpreting the Meaning of Colors in Recycling.” Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications 3(5): 1–17. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schloss, Karen B., Rolf Nelson, Laura Parker, Isobel A. Heck, and Stephen E. Palmer. 2017. “Seasonal Variations in Color Preference.” Cognitive Science 41: 1589–1612. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schloss, Karen B., and Stephen E. Palmer. 2017. “An Ecological Framework for Temporal and Individual Differences in Color Preferences.” Vision Research 141: 95–108. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schloss, Karen B., and David M. Sobel [under review]. “A Chromatic Interception: Generalization of Preferences through Color Similarity During the Super Bowl.”
Setlur, Vidya, and Maureen C. Stone. 2016. “A Linguistic Approach to Categorical Color Assignment for Data Visualization.” IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics 22: 698–707. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Strauss, Eli D., Karen B. Schloss, and Stephen E. Palmer. 2013. “Color Preferences Change after Experience with Liked/Disliked Colored Objects.” Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 20: 935–943. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Tanaka, James W., and Lynn M. Presnell. 1999. “Color Diagnosticity in Object Recognition.” Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics 61: 1140–1153. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Taylor, Chloe, and Anna Franklin. 2012. “The Relationship between Color–Object Associations and Color Preference: Further Investigation of Ecological Valence Theory.” Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 19: 190–197. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Thorstenson, Christopher A., Andrew J. Elliot, Adam D. Pazda, David I. Perrett, and Dengke Xiao. 2017. “Emotion–Color Associations in the Context of the Face.” Emotion (Early View). Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Tversky, Barbara. 2011. “Visualizing Thought.” Topics in Cognitive Science 3: 499–535. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Valdez, Patricia, and Albert Mehrabian. 1994. “Effects of Color on Emotions.” Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 123: 394–409. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wood, Michael. 1968. “Visual Perception and Map Design.” The Cartographic Journal 5: 54–64. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wright, Benjamin, and Lee Rainwater. 1962. “The Meanings of Color.” Journal of General Psychology 67: 89–99. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wyszecki, Günther W., and W. S. Stiles. 1982. Color Science: Concepts and Methods, Quantitative Data and Formulae. 2nd ed. New York: John Wiley & Sons.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Yokosawa, Kazuhiko, Karen B. Schloss, Michiko Asano, and Stephen E. Palmer. 2016. “Ecological Effects in Cross-Cultural Differences between US and Japanese Color Preferences.” Cognitive Science 40: 1590–1616. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Zacks, Jeff, and Barbara Tversky. 1999. “Bars and Lines: A Study of Graphic Communication.” Memory and Cognition 27: 1073–1079. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (11)

Cited by 11 other publications

Yang, Huilan, Beibei Huang, Lingling Li & Sumin Zhang
2025. Color Metaphor Mappings for Love Concepts: Empirical Evidence from Chinese Speakers. Metaphor and Symbol 40:1 ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Schloss, Karen B.
2024. Color Semantics in Human Cognition. Current Directions in Psychological Science 33:1 ► pp. 58 ff. DOI logo
Yang, Bailin, Tianxiang Wei, Frederick W. B. Li, Xiaohui Liang, Zhigang Deng & Yili Fang
2024. Color Theme Evaluation through User Preference Modeling. ACM Transactions on Applied Perception 21:3 ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Schloss, Karen B., Melissa A. Schoenlein & Kushin Mukherjee
2023. Color Semantics for Visual Communication. In Visualization Psychology, ► pp. 3 ff. DOI logo
Mukherjee, Kushin, Brian Yin, Brianne E. Sherman, Laurent Lessard & Karen B. Schloss
2022. Context Matters: A Theory of Semantic Discriminability for Perceptual Encoding Systems. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics 28:1 ► pp. 697 ff. DOI logo
Schoenlein, Melissa A. & Karen B. Schloss
2022. Colour-concept association formation for novel concepts. Visual Cognition 30:7 ► pp. 457 ff. DOI logo
Jonauskaite, Domicele, Lucia Camenzind, C. Alejandro Parraga, Cécile N. Diouf, Mathieu Mercapide Ducommun, Lauriane Müller, Mélanie Norberg & Christine Mohr
2021. Colour-emotion associations in individuals with red-green colour blindness. PeerJ 9 ► pp. e11180 ff. DOI logo
Ruba, Ashley L., Christopher A. Thorstenson & Betty M. Repacholi
2021. Red Enhances the Processing of Anger Facial Configurations as a Function of Target Gender. Social Cognition 39:3 ► pp. 396 ff. DOI logo
Thorstenson, Christopher A., Adam D. Pazda & Eva G. Krumhuber
2021. The influence of facial blushing and paling on emotion perception and memory. Motivation and Emotion 45:6 ► pp. 818 ff. DOI logo
Rathore, Ragini, Zachary Leggon, Laurent Lessard & Karen B. Schloss
2019. Estimating Color-Concept Associations from Image Statistics. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Schloss, Karen B., Laurent Lessard, Charlotte S. Walmsley & Kathleen Foley
2018. Color inference in visual communication: the meaning of colors in recycling. Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications 3:1 DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 24 november 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue