Using Single Colors and Color Pairs to Communicate Basic Tastes II: Foreground–Background Color Combinations

Abstract

People associate basic tastes (e.g., sweet, sour, bitter, and salty) with specific colors (e.g., pink or red, green or yellow, black or purple, and white or blue). In the present study, we investigated whether a color bordered by another color (either the same or different) would give rise to stronger taste associations relative to a single patch of color. We replicate previous findings, highlighting the existence of a robust crossmodal correspondence between individual colors and basic tastes. On occasion, color pairs were found to communicate taste expectations more consistently than were single color patches. Furthermore, and in contrast to a recent study in which the color pairs were shown side-by-side, participants took no longer to match the color pairs with tastes than the single colors (they had taken twice as long to respond to the color pairs in the previous study). Possible reasons for these results are discussed, and potential applications for the results, and for the testing methodology developed, are outlined.

See, Feel, Taste: The Influence of Receptacle Colour and Weight on the Evaluation of Flavoured Carbonated Beverages

“…The colour red was chosen for its positive association with sweetness [ 24 ]. While pink is also associated with sweetness [ 23 , 25 , 43 ], red cups were chosen because they masked the colour of the actual beverage better than pink. Since we were interested in masking the colour of the actual beverage, black cups were chosen as a “control” rather than white (Note here that white and black are also both associated with basic tastes, white with saltiness [ 15 ], and black with bitterness [ 44 ]).…”

“…Going beyond the colour of the drink itself, pink receptacles are more closely associated with sweetness than are transparent receptacles [ 23 ], and popcorn tasted from red bowls is reported to be approximately 15% sweeter as compared to popcorn from a white bowl [ 24 ]. Additionally, Woods and colleagues [ 25 ] found that pale pink alone or as part of a colour pair communicated the sweet taste more effectively than did any other colour. That said, it is worth noting that in all of the early studies between colour and taste, participants were restricted to the set of four or five basic tastes—sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and possibly also umami.…”

Olfactory-colour crossmodal correspondences in art, science, and design

“…Once multiple colours are combined, though, an additional factor suddenly comes into play, namely the harmony between the colours themselves; this might, in turn, come to interfere with any crossmodal mapping between the individual colours and odours (see Schifferstein & Howell, 2015 ; cf. Favre & November, 1979 ; Woods, Marmolejo-Ramos, Velasco, & Spence, 2016 ; Woods & Spence, 2016 ). Potentially relevant here, Langner ( 1997 ) found that abstract images containing two or three colour fields appeared to be less effective at triggering odour associations than those images with fewer colours.…”

Visual Design Cues Impacting Food Choice: A Review and Future Research Agenda

“…Product colour can set sensory and hedonic expectations regarding the likely taste and flavour properties of food and drink items (see for reviews [ 20 , 90 , 97 , 98 , 99 ]). Associations exist between red and pink with sweet, white and blue with salty, green and yellow with sour, and black and green with bitter [ 100 ]. In the context of food choice, red may still be connected to sweetness and green to sourness as many fruits become sweeter when they ripe and their colours transition from green to red [ 97 ].…”