What's So Hot about Red?

Abstract

A prevailing common-sense hypothesis (the "hue-heat " hypothesis) is that an environment which has dominant light frequencies toward the red end of the visible spectrum feels warm and one with dominant blue frequencies feels cool. Twenty-one students made thermal comfort ratings while wearing red, blue, and clear goggles during three 20-min. runs in which air conditions were "comfortable" and wall temperatures were varied from about 60' to 100°F and back. Four analyses were conducted of the temperatures at which subjects changed their thermal comfort judgment from one category t o another. While subject and direction-of-temperaturechange effects were significant, no hue main effects or interactions were found. I t was concluded that hue produces a strictly intellectual effect, a belief that one is warmer or cooler but does not affect one's thermal comfort.

Predicting Context-dependent Cross-modal Associations with Dimension-specific Polarity Attributions. Part 2: Red and Valence

“…As opposed to blue, red is associated with excitement and aggression (Bennett & Rey, 1972;Young et al, 2013), but as opposed to green, red is associated with negativity (Gil & Le Bigot, 2015;Moller et al, 2009). Together with the studies reported in Part 1 (Schietecat et al, 2018), the current set of studies provides the first evidence that context-dependent associations between concrete and affective abstract concepts might be predicted by dimension-specific polarity attributions.…”

“…Red also shows a strong association with danger (Pravossoudovitch, Cury, Young, & Elliot, 2014). In addition, red is suggested to be associated with negativity (e.g., Gil, & Le Bigot, 2015;Moller, Elliot, & Maier, 2009) and anger (e.g., Fetterman, Robinson, & Meier, 2012;Young, Elliot, Feltman, & Ambady, 2013) but also with warmth and excitement (e.g., Bennett & Rey, 1972).…”

“…However, a red-blue opposition is more commonly used to express temperature differences (e.g., the hot vs cold tap in a kitchen). Therefore, red in the context of blue is generally associated with warmth (e.g., Bennett & Rey, 1972;Ho, van Doorn, Kawabe, Watanabe, & Spence, 2014).…”

<b>Actual conditions of residents’ cooling behaviors related to visual and auditory sensation and estimation of their effect on energy saving in Japan </b>

“…These have shown that synthesized evaluation of discomfort in moderate stress regions can be expressed by the addition of discomfort stemming from sound, light, and heat factors. In terms of the effects of colors on thermal perception in the study of synthesized environmental evaluation, Bennett et al (1972) proposed the hue-heat hypothesis, namely that "human beings feel warm in an environment where red is the main color and cool in an environment where blue is the main color. " Fanger et al (1977) reported that, while there is a significant difference of 0.4°C in preferred temperature between the two extreme hues of red and blue, there is no practical implication for this difference.…”

Additional considerations concerning the effects of ‘warm’ and ‘cool’ wall colours on energy conservation

“…found such small differences in thermal tolerance (although in the expected direction) that they concluded the results were of little practical significance. Moreover, Bennett and Rey (1972) manipulated wall temperatures in an experimental chamber while subjects wore red, blue, or clear goggles. and found no differences in thermal comfort associated with colour.…”