# Color preferences

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Tendency for individual or group to prefer some colors over others

"Favourite colour" redirects here. For the song by Carly Rae Jepsen, see [Emotion (Carly Rae Jepsen album)](/source/Emotion_(Carly_Rae_Jepsen_album)).

Red items on a street market stall in [Wan Chai Market](/source/Wan_Chai_Market), Hong Kong. Red is considered lucky by many Chinese people.

In the [psychology of color](/source/Color_psychology), **color preferences** are the tendency for an individual or a group to [prefer](/source/Prefer) some [colors](/source/Color) over others, such as having a **favorite color** or a **traditional color**.

## Introduction

An 'ecological [valence](/source/Valence_(psychology)) theory' (EVT) has been suggested to explain why people have preferences for different colors. This is the idea that the preference for color is determined by the average [affective](/source/Affect_(psychology)) response to everything the individual associates with the color. Hence, positive emotional experiences with a particular color are likely to increase the propensity to develop a preference for that color and vice versa. Social and cultural factors also factor into this affective response. A study in 2011 on the effects of "school spirit" and color preferences found students at the [University of California, Berkeley](/source/University_of_California%2C_Berkeley) were more likely to favor the university's official colors than were students from their rival [Stanford University](/source/Stanford_University). This degree of preference was also correlated with their self-reported level of "school spirit". The researchers conducting the study concluded that this was evidence for the EVT.[1]

## Children

Infants as young as 12 weeks old exhibit color preferences.[2] Generally, children prefer the colors red/pink and blue, and cool colors are preferred over warm colors. Color perception of children 3–5 years of age is an indicator of their developmental stage. Color preferences tend to change as people age.[3]

## In different societies

Favoritism of colors varies widely. Often societal influences will have a direct impact on what colors are favored and disdained. In the West, the color black symbolizes mourning and sadness, red symbolizes anger and violence, white symbolizes purity and peace, and yellow symbolizes joy and luck (other colors lack a consistent meaning). From a recent study, it was discussed that [associative learning](/source/Associative_learning) is the process where an individual develops color preferences. In different countries, color preference vary. In [China](/source/China), red indicates luck, while in [Nigeria](/source/Nigeria) and [Germany](/source/Germany) it means the exact opposite.[4]

## See also

- [Car color popularity](/source/Car_colour_popularity)

- [Color psychology](/source/Color_psychology)

- [Color theory](/source/Color_theory)

- [Color vision](/source/Color_vision)

- [Lüscher color test](/source/L%C3%BCscher_color_test)

## References

1. **[^](#cite_ref-1)** Schloss, Karen B.; Poggesi, Rosa M.; Palmer, Stephen E. (5 March 2011). ["Effects of university affiliation and "school spirit" on color preferences: Berkeley versus Stanford"](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3098359). *Psychonomic Bulletin & Review*. **18** (3): 498–504. [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.3758/s13423-011-0073-1](https://doi.org/10.3758%2Fs13423-011-0073-1). [PMC](/source/PMC_(identifier)) [3098359](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3098359). [PMID](/source/PMID_(identifier)) [21380587](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21380587).

1. **[^](#cite_ref-ZemachTeller2007_2-0)** Zemach, Iris K.; Teller, Davida Y. (May 2007). "Infant color vision: Infants' spontaneous color preferences are well behaved". *Vision Research*. **47** (10): 1362–1367. [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1016/j.visres.2007.02.002](https://doi.org/10.1016%2Fj.visres.2007.02.002). [ISSN](/source/ISSN_(identifier)) [0042-6989](https://search.worldcat.org/issn/0042-6989). [PMID](/source/PMID_(identifier)) [17397896](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17397896).

1. **[^](#cite_ref-3)** Read, M., & Upington, D. (2009). Young Children's Color Preferences in the Interior Environment. *Early Childhood Education Journal,* 36(6), 491–496. [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1007/s10643-009-0311-6](https://doi.org/10.1007%2Fs10643-009-0311-6)

1. **[^](#cite_ref-4)** Sable, Paul; Akcay, Okan (February 2010). "Color: Cross Cultural Marketing Perspectives As To What Governs Our Response To It". *American Society of Business and Behavioral Sciences*. **17** (1): 950–954.

## Further reading

- Crozier, W. Ray (1999), "The meanings of colour: preferences among hues", *Pigment & Resin Technology*, **28** (1): 6–14, [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1108/03699429910252315](https://doi.org/10.1108%2F03699429910252315)

- Ellis, Lee; Ficek, Christopher (December 2001), "Color preferences according to gender and sexual orientation", *Personality and Individual Differences*, **31** (8): 1375–1379, [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1016/S0191-8869(00)00231-2](https://doi.org/10.1016%2FS0191-8869%2800%2900231-2)

- Grossman, Randi; Wisenblit, Joseph Z. Priluck (1999), "What we know about consumers' color choices", *Journal of Marketing Practice: Applied Marketing Science*, **5** (3): 78–88, [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1108/EUM0000000004565](https://doi.org/10.1108%2FEUM0000000004565)

- Madden, Thomas J.; Hewett, Kelly; Roth, Martin S. (2000), "Managing Images in Different Cultures: A Cross-National Study of Color Meanings and Preferences", *Journal of International Marketing*, **8** (4): 90–107, [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1509/jimk.8.4.90.19795](https://doi.org/10.1509%2Fjimk.8.4.90.19795), [S2CID](/source/S2CID_(identifier)) [155065770](https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:155065770)

- Morse, Janice M. (March 2008), ""What's your favorite color?" Reporting irrelevant demographics in qualitative research", *Qualitative Health Research*, **18** (3): 299–300, [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1177/1049732307310995](https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1049732307310995), [PMID](/source/PMID_(identifier)) [18235153](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18235153), [S2CID](/source/S2CID_(identifier)) [42214073](https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:42214073)

- Saito, Miho (February 1996), "Comparative studies on color preference in Japan and other Asian regions, with special emphasis on the preference for white", *Color Research & Application*, **21** (1): 35–49, [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1002/(SICI)1520-6378(199602)21:1<35::AID-COL4>3.0.CO;2-6](https://doi.org/10.1002%2F%28SICI%291520-6378%28199602%2921%3A1%3C35%3A%3AAID-COL4%3E3.0.CO%3B2-6)

- Teller, Davida; Civan, Andrea; Bronson-Castain, Kevin (2004), "Infants' spontaneous color preferences are not due to adult-like brightness variations", *Visual Neuroscience*, **21** (3): 397–401, [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1017/S0952523804213360](https://doi.org/10.1017%2FS0952523804213360), [PMID](/source/PMID_(identifier)) [15518220](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15518220), [S2CID](/source/S2CID_(identifier)) [37398241](https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:37398241)

- Zemach, Iris; Chang, Susan; Teller, Davida Y. (May 2007), "Infant color vision: Prediction of infants' spontaneous color preferences", *Vision Research*, **47** (10): 1368–1381, [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1016/j.visres.2006.09.024](https://doi.org/10.1016%2Fj.visres.2006.09.024), [PMID](/source/PMID_(identifier)) [17118421](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17118421)

## External links

- ["The Survey Results"](http://awp.diaart.org/km/surveyresults.html). *awp.diaart.org*.

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Color preferences](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_preferences) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_preferences?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.