Effects of Shape and Area Ratio on Color Emotion

Abstract

The aim of this thesis is to examine the reliability of color emotion and to investigate the effect of shape and on color emotion. To achieve this aim, three psychophysical experiments were conducted. The Reliability-test experiment was intended to examine the reliability of color emotion. The reliability on color emotions were examined through the first experiment (Reliability-test experiment) and second experiment (Area ratio experiment). First, the observer accuracy and repeatability was examined. The observers were Koreans who were familiar with English. It is assumed that the meaning of Korean adjectives and English adjectives are the same. The Korean word experiment was conducted two or three weeks after the English word experiment. The observer accuracy was reasonable and color emotion is repeatable among the observers. Second, the reproducibility with a foreign color emotion study (Ou et al., 2004a, 2004b) was examined. From his experiments, small numbers of test color patterns were selected and presented in a viewing booth. The process of conducting the experiment was designed to the same as Ou et al.,’s experiments. As a result, color emotion is reproducible with his study. Third, the repeatability between two different viewing condition - viewing booth and LCD monitor - was tested. The single color emotion was repeatable between two different viewing conditions, but the pair color was not. The Area ratio experiment was designed to investigate the effect of area ratio on pair color emotion. The test pair patterns are shown on the LCD monitor. The area ratio of the left one of the pair was increased from 0% to 100% via 8 steps. Next, color emotion changes by area ratio changes were investigated. As a result, the pair color emotions shown on the LCD monitor were hard to predict using the additivity model. Furthermore, across the other two experiments, the additivity model was tested to predict pair color emotion. The additivity model shows a high performance around a half and half area ratio. The Shape experiment was intended to investigate the shape effect on color emotion. The test shapes were seasonal women’s garments. The test patterns are shown on the LCD monitor. The color emotions with each shape and color emotions with rectangles were investigated. The gender differences on color emotion are very small, while shape emotion is considerably different between them. In the male’s case, color emotion with shape shifts towards shape emotion, while in the female’s case, color emotion with shapes is not effected by shape emotion. The female observers consider mainly color emotion. In conclusion, the color emotion study is reliable in terms of observer accuracy and repeatability and reproducibility with a foreign study. The additivity model can predict pair color emotion with around a half and half area ratio. There is little color emotion difference between genders. However, shape emotion is different between them as shape affects color emotion among males. Therefore, designers should consider shape, gender or area ratio as well as color when they design products. Further color emotion studies should consider the other design elements such as texture, fonts, lines or three dimensional objects.