The Effect of Noise on the Color Associations of Citizens

Griber Yuliya Alexandrovna Doctor of Cultural Studies Professor, Director of Color Laboratory at Smolensk State University 214000, Russia, Smolensk region, Smolensk, Przhevalskogo str., 4 y.griber@gmail.com Other publications by this author

Nankevich Alena Anvarovna Postgraduate, Department of Sociology and Philosophy, Smolensk State University 214000, Russia, Smolensk region, Smolensk, Przhevalskogo str., 4 alena.nankevitch@yandex.ru

IntroductionModern life is getting more and more noisy every year.

Urban residents are accompanied by noise almost everywhere: on the streets, in the car and public transport, at work and school, in shops, in restaurants, bars, cafes and even at home. Modern people are used to a constant background sound, and in most cases they do not notice it or are able to ignore it.

Nevertheless, noise significantly affects many physiological and mental processes. Under the influence of loud sounds, feelings and behavior change. People eat and drink more ^[1]. The intensity of perception of sweet and salty tastes decreases ^[2], and food-related odors (lemon, orange, dark chocolate, and others) give less pleasure ^[3].

According to the researchers, the noted cross-modal effects are most likely a kind of reaction to stress and can be mediated by the influence of noise on the level of arousal, which, in turn, affects the perception of taste. Another possible explanation is based on the fact that noise distracts our attention, and we "experience" the world differently (see research review ^[4]).

Extraneous sounds also noticeably affect various cognitive processes. Sounding speech, music, office noise and street sounds change perception, attention, memory, interfere with thinking, remembering and remembering (see research review ^[5]).  Irrelevant to the task and ignored sounds make it difficult to understand the read text (see, for example: ^[6]), reduce the effectiveness of verification and proofreading ^[7], affect visual perception ^[8] and visual search ^[9], verbal and visual memory (see, for example: ^[10]).

At the same time, a review of recent studies on the effect of noise on cognitive activity, presented in the work of S. Schlittmeier and J. Marsh ^[5], shows that the effect of sound on color cognition and the processing of color-related information remains outside the scope of the research focus.

Meanwhile, there is no doubt that there is a stable relationship between different color characteristics (brightness, tone, saturation) and sound parameters (volume, pitch, vibration) (see e.g.: ^[11]). According to the experimental data obtained, color quite significantly affects the perception of volume unrelated to objects (see e.g.: ^[12].), the noise of cars ^[13], trains ^[14] and household appliances ^[15]. Color affects the assessment of the degree of noise-induced irritation ^[16] and is able to change visual and auditory preferences ^[17].

On the other hand, modern studies of color cognition convince us that the perception of color is noticeably associated with a change in the physiological and psychological state. A person perceives, evaluates and remembers the color differently if he feels fear, pain, cold, pleasant or unpleasant odors (see subsp.: ^{[18; 19]}). A change in the emotional background and an increase in the level of anxiety are directly related to the perception of color (see for example: ^{[20; 21]}).

The available theoretical and empirical data suggest that the processes of cognitive processing of color-related information can be significantly influenced by sound stimuli. In particular, extraneous noise can rebuild the system of associations of individual shades with anthropologically significant concepts.

The purpose of our experimental study was to test the hypothesis that under the influence of noise in the system of color associations of citizens, changes in the structure and density, frequency of shades with different chromatic characteristics (lightness, tone, saturation) will be observed; changes are likely to affect the color images of individual concepts.

The object of the study is urban residents accustomed to noise, the subject is the effect of noise on their color associations with anthropologically significant concepts.

MethodParticipants.

The experiment involved 50 people (14 men and 36 women) aged 17 to 24 years (average age 19.71, SD=1.72) who were born and raised in an urban environment. Their responses were compared with the results of a control group that had participated in the same study earlier and had not been exposed to a sound stimulus ^[22]. None of the participants had any problems with color perception and color discrimination.

Incentives. The study used a palette comprising 27 color samples of the NCS natural color system (Fig. 1). It included saturated shades of four simple colors (Y – yellow, R – red, B – blue, G – green) and four composite colors (Y50R – orange, R50B – purple, B50G – blue-green, G50Y – green-yellow). The group of saturated shades in the experiment was conventionally designated by the letter B (Table 1). In addition, light (Table 1, group A) and dark (Table 1, group C) shades were selected for each tone. The palette also included achromatic colors – white, gray and black (Table 1, Group 1).

Table 1. Color samples of the experimentFigure 1. Arrangement of shades of group A (left), B (center) and C (right) in the triangle NCS

Experiment procedure. The participants of the experimental group were asked to compare color palette samples with 26 concepts (warm–cold, sad–joyful, calm–restless, close–distant, young–old, female–male, fast–slow, strong–weak, fake–sincere, cheap–expensive, safe–dangerous, healthy–sick, I am the others) and independently enter the code of the selected shade in the form. All color samples were presented to the participants at the same time. The duration of the choice was not limited. The same shades could be chosen several times, that is, the same colors could be used as associations with different concepts. During the study, pink noise was broadcast through the stereo system, the indicators of which were controlled by the experimenter. Half of the experimental group (N=25) underwent the experiment under the influence of noise with a volume of 60 dB (A), the second half (N=25) – under noise conditions with a volume of 80 dB (A). The volume of the sound stimulus was measured using a Xiaomi Duka FB-1 noise meter.

The participants of the control group performed the same experimental task without sound exposure.

The research database comprised 2,600 responses, half of which were collected under noise exposure.

Data analysis and visualization. The analysis of the obtained data of the associative experiment was carried out using cognitive interpretation procedures, which made it possible to draw presumptive conclusions about the features of mental processes in the respondents' minds (see appendix: ^[23]).

To assess the similarity of the structure of the association system in two subgroups of the experimental group with different loudness of noise exposure (60 dB(A) and 80 dB(A)), the Shorygin index was used in the study ^[24]:

 SHR= ?min(p_i1, p_i2),            (1)where ? min(p i 1, p i 2) is the smaller of the two relative values of the association in the compared samples, p i j= n i / N j, n ij is the frequency of occurrence of the association in the sample, and N j=? n ij.

To assess the degree of diversity of the obtained color associations, the Shannon, Simpson and Margalef indices were used (see subsp.: ^{[25; 26]}).

The Shannon Diversity Index was calculated using the formula:

 ,   (2)where i – various associations, – the probability of meeting a certain association in the sample, which is calculated by the formula, – the number of associations of a certain type, N – the number of responses.

The Margalef index was calculated using the formula:

d=(s–1) / lnN,       (3)where s is the number of types of associations, N is the number of responses.

To calculate the Simpson index , the formula was used:

D = 1 – ?(n_i (n_i–1)) / N(N–1),    (4)where n i is the number of associations of a certain type, N is the number of responses.

Bubble diagrams were used to visualize patterns of redistribution of color associations.

Results and discussion

The experiment showed noticeable transformations of the color association system under the influence of sound stimuli. Differences were manifested (1) in the structure and density of a set of color associations; (2) in the frequency of selected shades from different groups; (3) in the color images of individual concepts.

(1) The structure and density of a set of color associations. Since we did not find statistically significant differences between the color associations of participants from the two experimental subgroups – the patterns obtained under the influence of noise with a volume of 60 dB(A) and 80 Db(A) turned out to be identical (SHR = 0.6017; r = 0.7027, p < 0.00001) – we combined the responses obtained in these subgroups and all further calculations were performed for the experimental group as a whole (N = 25 + 25 = 50).

To compare the diversity of the obtained color associations in the experimental and control groups, we calculated the Shannon, Margalef and Simpson indices (Table. 2), which are traditionally used in ecology, each with specific goals.

The Shannon index (2), which is used in environmental studies to determine biodiversity and reflects the complexity of the community structure (in our study, the structure of a set of color associations), had a slightly lower value in the experimental group than in the control group (H _E = 5.56; H _K = 5.66).

The Margalef index (3), which in biodiversity studies allows us to draw conclusions about the species richness and density of species in a certain territory, and in relation to our material shows a variety of color associations (the higher this indicator, the more different associative pairs), also turned out to be smaller in the experimental group (d _E = 52.19; d _K = 56.56).

On the contrary, the Simpson index (4), which allows us to determine the dominance of certain species of the community (in our case, different color associations) and increases with the dominance of one or more species, was slightly lower in the control group (D _E = 0.005; D _K = 0.004).

The recorded decrease in the Shannon and Margalef indices with an increase in the Simpson index suggests that in the structure of color associations in the experimental group, there is a decrease in the number of types of associations and an increase in the dominance of individual connections.

Table 2. Diversity indexesIndexes

(2) Frequency of selected shades from different groups. While the participants of the control group used shades of different tones with almost the same frequency, under the influence of noise, the number of selections of red (by 120%), yellow (by 88%), blue (by 28%) and achromatic (by 34%) shades noticeably increased. On the contrary, all shades of green with different lightness were much less common: light, dark and bright green; light, dark and bright blue-green; light, dark and bright green-yellow (Fig. 2 on the left).

Figure 2. Frequency of tone selection (left) and lightness (right)in the control and experimental groups

The popularity rating of shades of different lightness has also changed: the number of dark shades has significantly decreased and the number of bright ones has increased (Fig. 2 on the right).

The frequency of the bright red shade (B4) increased markedly, which the participants chose more than one and a half times more often under the influence of noise (119 choices in the experimental group and 77 in the control group) (Fig. 3).

  Figure 3. Frequency of shade selection in the control (left) and experimental (right) groups; shades are arranged in descending order of frequency in the control group(3) Color images of individual concepts.

Under the influence of noise in the value of bright red (B4), the semes of expensive (22%), dangerous (16%) and strong (14%) increased. Bright yellow (B2) was much more often associated with warm and joyful (18 and 12%, respectively); bright blue (B6) - with fast (16%).

On the contrary, light shades were noticeably more often used to indicate connections with concepts with a positive connotation: light yellow (A2) - with sincere (16%), weak (10%), safe (10%); pink (A4) – with warm and feminine (8% each); blue (A6) – with close and safe (14 and 6%, respectively).

The color images of the concepts warm, joyful, calm, close, young, old, fast, strong, fake, expensive, dangerous, I have changed most noticeably (Fig. 4).

Figure 4. The most noticeable differences in the color images of conceptsin the control (left) and experimental (right) groups

Conclusion and conclusions

The conducted experiment gave an interesting combination of expected and unexpected results.

Firstly, the ignored noise really had a noticeable effect on color-related associations, which manifested themselves both in changing the structure of color associations and the frequency of selected shades from different groups, and in the transformation of color images of individual concepts.

Secondly, the effect of a noise stimulus led to a sharp increase in the proportion of red color choices and an increase in the rating of other physiologically significant shades to which the optic nerve reacts - blue, yellow and achromatic white, black and gray.

Thirdly, under the influence of noise, color associations became less diverse and acquired a simpler structure (Table. 2), in which the dominance of several links has increased (Fig. 3), first of all, the links of action concepts with a bright red color (Fig. 4).

Fourth, the structure of color associations was not affected by the change in noise volume: the patterns obtained under the influence of 60 dB (A) and 80 Db (A) turned out to be identical.

The data obtained by us are important for understanding the cognitive mechanisms of color exposure and establishing causal relationships between a given color stimulation and its effect on an individual.

We believe that the revealed differences are manifested as a result of the transfer of sensations, the mechanism of which has been well studied in experiments with the perception of smells and tastes (see for example.: ^{[4; 27; 28]}). According to this point of view, what a person feels in relation to background sounds (in our case, noise) can affect his assessment of the sensations of other modalities that he perceives at this moment. Noise, like a halo, accompanies the perception of smell, taste or (in our case) color, and the sensations associated with it are transferred to judgments about other attributes (in our case, concepts).

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