Reaction Times to Recognize Different Tonalities of Colours: A Cross-sectional Study

Introduction: Colors have a great influence on the mood and mental states of human beings, and since humans are in close relation with the colors, the colors are very important. Colors play an active and effective role in everyday life. Therefore, they are among the most important visual elements that have emotional and psychological burden. Colors allow people to understand the environment, acquire information and orientate, and interact more with the environment. One of main factors affecting the success rate in computer games is the short enough reaction time to the stimulus. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to compare the reaction time in young people to different tonalities of the four main colors in psychology.Materials and Methods: The sample consisted of ۶۰ male and female students from Faculty of Multimedia, Tabriz Islamic Art University, Tabriz, Iran, who volunteered to participate in the study. Reaction times to different colors were measured in ۲۰ randomized trials with five different tonalities of the four psychological primary colours (blue, green, yellow, and red). Data analysis was performed by repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Tukey post hoc test.Results: The least mean color reaction time was recorded for blue, which was significantly different from other colors (P = ۰.۰۰۲). In general, the mean color recognition time among females was reported longer than that in males, however this difference was not statistically significant.Conclusion: The lowest and highest reaction time in young people was associated with blue and yellow, respectively. Therefore, using blue in danger signs may cause the viewer to react faster in order to reduce the risk of injury.

Keywords:

Reaction time , Color tonalities , Color recognition , Players , Computer games