(RED)wavelength: 625-740 nmfrequency 480-405 THz

Color Affects Us.

SYMBOLISM

Color symbolism, in art and anthropology, refers to the use of color as a symbol throughout culture.

Red is often used in North America to indicate stop, as with a stop sign, or danger, as with a warning light. At the same, time red symbolizes love, as with Valentine’s Day. A person not familiar with the cultural coding of red in North America could, theoretically, confuse the symbolism of red and mistake a red Valentine’s Day heart for a warning.

It is believed that red makes the heart beat faster. Red strikes a chord with more cultures than many other colors because of its intensity, passion and invocation of an inherent physiologi-cal response. Red is the color of celebration and good luck (China), purity and integrity (India), mourning (South Africa) and communism. When used with a wide brush, red typically makes whatever it’s painted on look larger, whether it’s a torso or wingback chair. The color is bold and audacious, so it usu-ally dilutes the colors around it. For this reason it’s used to ac-cent and highlight objects of importance.

Red typically symbolizes passion, strength, energy, fire, love, romance, excitement, speed, heat, arrogance, ambition, lead-ership, masculinity, power, danger, gaudiness, blood, war, an-ger, revolution, radicalism, socialism, communism, aggression, respect, martyrs, the Holy Spirit, conservatism (US politics), Liberalism (Canadian politics), wealth (China), and marriage (India).

Color consultants claim hues in the red area of color are typi-cally viewed as “warm” while those in the blue and green range are typically viewed as “cool”. Reds are also viewed as active and exciting, while the blues and greens are viewed as sooth-ing and passive. Physiological tests have revealed similar responses. It is claimed that red hues increase bodily tension and stimulate the autonomic nervous system.

GuiltAnger

andSin,Red is frequently used as a symbol of guilt, sin and anger, often as connected with blood or sex. A biblical example is found in Isaiah: “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow.” Also, The Scarlet Letter an 1850 American novel by Nathaniel Hawthorne, features a woman in a Puritan New England community who is punished for adultery with ostracism, her sin represented by a red letter ‘A’ sewn into her clothes. This all comes from a general Hebrew view inherited by Christianity which associates red with the blood of murder, as well as with guilt in general. Another popular example of this is in the phrase “caught red-handed”, meaning either caught in an act of crime or caught with the blood of murder still on one’s hands. At one point, red was associated with prostitutes, or now, with brothels (red-light districts). In Roman Catholicism, red represents wrath, one of the Seven Deadly Sins. In Christianity, Satan is usually depicted as colored red and/or wearing a red costume in both iconography and popular culture. Statistics have shown that red cars are more likely to be involved in accidents.The color red is associated with lust, passion, love, and beauty as well. The association with love and beauty is possibly related to the use of red roses as a love symbol. Both the Greeks and the Hebrews considered red a symbol of love, as well as sacrifice. Psychological research has shown that men find women who are wearing red more attractive.

Red is also used as a symbol of courage and sac-rifice, as in blood spilt in sacrifice or courage in the face of lethal danger. Examples of this are found in the flags of many nations including the United States, as well as in the novel The Red Badge of Courage, in which a soldier in the American Civil War discovers the meaning of courage.

Besides the association with guilt previously men-tioned, in Christianity, red represents the color of Christian martyrs who suffered death for their faith. It is sometimes used for Holy Thursday and dur-ing Easter, and red green and white is the color scheme of Christmas. In Roman Catholic tradition it is used for all feast days of Christian martyrs as well as Palm Sunday in anticipation of the death of Jesus. Along the same lines, red is associated in Roman mythology with the god of war, Mars. A Roman general receiving a triumph had his entire body painted red in honor of his achievement. The phrase “red-blooded” describes someone who is audacious, robust, or virile. In English heraldry, red (called gules) denoted ardent affection or love, while crimson (blood-color) stood for boldness, en-thusiasm, or impetuosity.

CourageandSacrifice

WARNING!Red catches people’s attention, and is often used either in a negative way to indicate danger and emergency, or in a posi-tive way in advertising to gain more viewers, or in nature, as a ripe fruit announces its readi-ness with its red color. Several studies have indicated that red carries the strongest reaction of all the colors, with the level of reaction decreasing gradu-ally with orange, yellow, and white, respectively. Because of this, scientists have repeatedly recommended red for warning signals, labels, and signs. Be-cause of these recommenda-tions, red has seen widespread use as a danger signal, in stop signs, to warn people of extreme heat or flammability, and even to signal warnings in sports such as soccer.

ologicalPsych

Color psychology refers to investigating the effect of color on human behavior and feeling.

Color psychology is an immature field of study viewed dubiously by main-stream psychologists and therefore qualifies as “alternative medicine”. Crit-ics view it as an overstatement of what can be justified by research, and point out that different cultures have com-pletely different interpretations of color.

“Colors are constructs of the brain, not physical realities, and the presumption would thus be that whatever color or color combination is most appealing to humans is attractive because of some ecological/evolutionary advantage,” explains Dale Purves, M.D., Director of the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience at Duke University.

The most emotionally intense color, red stimulates a faster heartbeat and breathing. It is also the color of love. Red clothing gets noticed and makes the wearer appear heavier. Since it is an extreme color, red clothing might not help people in negotiations or confron-tations. Red cars are popular targets for thieves. In decorating, red is usually used as an accent. Decorators say that red furniture should be perfect since it will attract attention.

PhysiologicalIt seems hard to believe that colors can have an impact on our body and mind. However, scientists know colors can influence our body’s physiology and mental states. In a study by Wohlfarth and Sam, the color environment of 14 handicapped children was altered resulting in a measurable change in blood pressure and a decrease in aggressive behavior.

The power of colors stimulates our nervous system and evokes emo-tional states. The colors of our environment travels through our eyes to our brain causing various hormonal releases.

The meaning of colors varies depending on one’s culture, race, gender, and even age. So, it isn’t just the selection of colors in general but also which colors to use with your target customers. For instance, white is often associated with weddings in North America and evokes the feel-ing of innocence. In Eastern cultures, white signifies death. An exporter of white wedding gowns to China would go broke in no time. Colors can be combined to signify meaning to a culture. In the western world, green and red are associated with Christmas, while black and orange represent Halloween.

Scientists might not yet know why certain colors are such strong visual cues for us, but they do know that we can learn to attach meaning to certain color combinations.

AdvertisingFor a long time, color has been used by advertisers to encourage us to purchase their products or services instead of their competitors. In fact, use of color in advertising has be-come somewhat of a science unto itself.

It’s a well known fact that different colors affect us in different ways. For example, red inspires impulsive buy-ing. Our eyes are drawn to the color like ducks to water. Just walk into any supermarket and you will notice that red is the color used most often on products.

Ever wonder why this is?

The reason is simple. It has been documented that these colors cause excitement thus raising the blood pressure and causing the pupils to dilate, which goes to prove one thing:

Color affects us.

SPORT

When opponents of a game are equally matched, the team dressed in red is more likely to win, ac-cording to a new study.

British anthropologists Russell Hill and Robert Barton of the University of Durham reached that conclusion by studying the outcomes of one-on-one boxing. In each event Olympic staff randomly assigned red or blue clothing or body protection to competitors. When otherwise equally matched with their opponent in fitness and skill, athletes wear-ing red were more likely to win the bout. In equally matched bouts, the preponderance of red wins was great enough that it could not be attributed to chance, the anthropologists say. Hill and Barton found similar results in a review of the colors worn at the Euro 2004 international soccer tournament.

The Cincinnati Red Stockings are the oldest pro-fessional baseball team, dating back to 1869. The franchise soon relocated to Boston and is now the Atlanta Braves, but its name survives as the origin for both the Cincinnati Reds and Boston Red Sox. During the 1950s when red was so strongly associ-ated with communism, the modern Cincinnati team was known as the “Redlegs” and the term was even used on baseball cards. After the red scare faded, the team was known as the Reds again.

Why do we use red and yellow to alert us to fast food and danger? Red/yellow says, “The food’s good here and pretty cheap, too,” and, out of the other side of its signifying mouth cries, “Watch out! Trouble ahead!” The National Fire Protection Association uses c olor-coded warnings in which red indicates flammability, and yellow indicates reactivity. The U.S. Department of Transportation identifies the Pantone colors for its traffic signs, reserving red (187), yellow (116), and

orange (152) for the most important cau-tionary signs. At the same time, hundreds

of fast-food joints and cheap eateries rely on the red/yellow/orange combo, their exit-ramp signs bloom-ing from Seattle to Shanghai. Mother Nature warns us with the red and yellow of the poisonous coral snake (red on yellow kills a fellow/red on black, venom lack). If not by instinct, then perhaps by experience we learn to associate danger with red and yellow. Either way, do fast-food folks bait us with danger colors and then switch to assuring us of the proximity of rice noodles and cheesesteak?

Before McDonald’s, red and yellow had a cautionary history in America. Standardizing traffic signs in 1924, highway departments required stop signs to have white letters on red while caution signs had black letters on yellow. The first lone McDonald’s opened in 1940 in San Bernadino, California, and catered to drive-up customers. In 1948, it ditched the carhops and delivered the world’s first fast-food burgers. In that same year, Nels Garden, one of the heads of the University of California Radiation Laboratory in Berkeley, objected to yellow as a background color for the newly designed radiation symbol because yellow was too commonly used as a warning. Testers cut out the three-bladed radiation symbol (evoking sun rays) in magenta and stuck them to colored cards twenty feet away. A committee chose magenta on yellow as the best combination. Four years later, the first pair of golden arches reflected the rays of the Arizona sun. The golden arches were added as an architectural flourish in 1953, a year before Roy Kroc showed up (Kroc launched the franchise in 1955; other 1954 visitors included the found-ers of Burger King and Taco Bell). In the 1960s, the arches were removed from the brick and mortar and installed in the logo.

McDonald’s grew into a global behemoth, begetting its thousands of red-and-yellow fast-food children all over the world, to the extent that it’s possible most people today, when confronted with blank blobs of red and yellow, might think, “Big Mac,” before they think “traffic warning” or “radiation” or “fire hazard.”

With McDonald’s having done the work of spreading the red-and-yellow gospel, maybe fast-food joints decided to ride the golden coattails. And once fast-food joints asserted their red-and-yellow identity, turning red and yellow into the colors of fast food and cheap dining in general, restaurant newcomers might recognize the value to be gained by sticking with the pack, calling all drivers and passersby to the fast-food rows of Den-ver and New Delhi.

REDYELLOW

and

Red is one of the most common colors used on national flags through-out the world. The use of red has some similar con-notations from country to country: the blood, sac-rifice, and courage of those who defended their coun-try; the sun and the hope and warmth it bring; and the sacrifice of Christ’s blood (in some his-torically Christian nations) are a few examples. Red is the color of the flags of several countries which once belonged to the former British Empire.

Politics

Socialist Red

Even before Europe’s Revolutions of 1848, “Socialist” red was used as a color of European Revolutionaries, often in the form of the red flag. It was also used by Garibaldi’s camicie rosse (“redshirts”) in the Italian Risorgimento, and taken up by Left-ist and generally revolutionary groups, while the white of legiti-mist Bourbon partisans became associated with pre-World War I conservatives. This relates to the term “Blood of the workers”, representing the suffering of the proletariat. For instance the Civil War in Russia and the Civil War in Finland were fought be-tween the “Red Army” and various “White Armies”.

(The Vietnam Wall stands in Washington, D.C.)

Communist Red

The identification of Communism with “Socialist” red (with the red flag being the primary color of the flag of the Soviet Union) and the red star being a Communist emblem led to such Cold War phrases as “the Red Menace” and “Red China” (distinguished from Nationalist China, “Free China,” or Taiwan).

China’s de-facto anthem under Mao Zedong was The East Is Red.Mao Zedong was sometimes referred to as a “red sun”. The color was also associated with political vehicles such as the Red Guard in China and the Red Guards during the Russian Revolution of 1917 as well as with left wing paramilitary terrorist groups such as the Red Army Faction in Germany and the Japanese Red Army.

Political Partys

Red remains associated with parties on the left of the political spec-trum. However, the major exception is the United States. There, red is associated with Republican Party, which is right-wing. Red and black are colors associated with anarchism.

CommunismandSocialism

NATURE Joanna Setchell, a primate researcher at the

University of Cambridge in England, has found similar results in nature. Her work with the large African

monkeys known as mandrills shows that red coloration gives males an advantage when it comes to mating.

In Nature, red, often combined with yellow or black sug-gests poison or danger. Some cunning nonpoisonous ani-mal use false markings to convince predators that they

are toxic. Meanwhile, flowers and fruits that require pollination compete to attract insects and animals

with their colorful displays.

is the effect of REDon a car?

What

Red is strong, and very basic. Pure red is the simplest col-or, with no subtlety. It is stimulating and lively, very friendly. At the same time, it can be perceived as demanding and aggressive. Driving a car can be an exhilarating experi-ence. Studies have been shown that the color Red raises the blood pressure. It typically makes whatever it’s painted on look larger, whether it’s a torso or wingback chair. The color is bold and audacious, so it usually dilutes the col-ors around it. Among many things, a red car symbolizes passion, strength, energy, fire, love, excitement and heat. These add to the attraction of the car, and the person driv-ing it. Reds are viewed as active and exciting, it increases bodily tension and stimulates the autonomic nervous sys-tem.

A red car is asking for attention. It stands out from the crowd. The color directly translates to speed, strength, sex, and attraction. For someone looking to be associ-ated with these symbolic meanings, then the choice of this color is obvious. A car in any other color would take on a sharply different meaning.

redBox?Australian Post. The color here is used as an identity. Red represents not only consistency, but speed in delivery for this instance. Here, we see Red combined with the Australian Post logo to create a brand.

This color red says, “Post” You see a red box on the street, you know without hesitation what it represents and what it’s function is. Our eye needs to be drawn to it. We need to be able to walk down a street and locate a Post box. That would not be so easy it it were green or grey! This is an effective color choice for something thats function is literally to be seen and attract people to it.

Color Affects, “Psychological Properties of Colors”. 22 May 2009. <http://www.colour-affects.co.uk/psychological-properties-of-colours>.

Darrell Zahorsky, “What color is your business?” 17th May 2009. <http://sbinformation.about.com/cs/advertising/a/colors.htm>.

David Barringer, “Red and Yellow Kills a Fellow”. 15 May 2009: <http://www.aiga.org/content.cfm/red-and-yellow-kills-a-fellow?pff=2>.

David Johnson, “Color Psychology”. 19 May 2009. <http://www.infoplease.com/spot/colors1.html>.

John Roach, “In Sports, Red is Winning Color, Study Says”. 13 May 2009: <http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/05/0518_050518_ redsports.html>. Precision Intermedia, “Color Psychology and Marketing”. 20 May 2009. <http://www.precisionintermedia.com/color.html>.

“The Use of Color in Advertising” 19th May 2009. <http://www.24karatmarketer.com/?p=265>.

Tom Fraser, Adam Banks: The Complete Guide to Colour. The Ilex Press Limited, pp. 24-67: 2004.

Wikipedia, “Color Symbolism and Psychology”. 21 May 2009. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_symbolism>.

ALL PHOTOS © DREW LESCH-WRAGGE

WorksCited