The Effects of Affective Arousal on Color Perception and Memory

The link between affective arousal, color perception, and color memory was explored by inducing fear, sadness, or embarrassment in 158 participants who them completed a color perception and memory task. It was predicted that participants experiencing fear or embarrassment would more often correctly identify and remember red and green than a neutral condition whereas experiencing sadness would lead to less correct identification and memory for blue and yellow than neutral. There was only a marginally significant effect of fear on color memory for red. In the low arousal condition, there was an effect of fear on color memory for green and a marginally significant effect for red. Color perception and color memory scores were correlated for all colors except green. No direct effect of arousal level on color perception was found, however there may be an effect mediated by other factors. Red color memory may be modulated by fear