Dataset Information

Striking individual differences in color perception uncovered by 'the dress' photograph.

ABSTRACT: 'The dress' is a peculiar photograph: by themselves the dress' pixels are brown and blue, colors associated with natural illuminants, but popular accounts (#TheDress) suggest the dress appears either white/gold or blue/black. Could the purported categorical perception arise because the original social-media question was an alternative-forced-choice? In a free-response survey (N = 1401), we found that most people, including those naïve to the image, reported white/gold or blue/black, but some said blue/brown. Reports of white/gold over blue/black were higher among older people and women. On re-test, some subjects reported a switch in perception, showing the image can be multistable. In a language-independent measure of perception, we asked subjects to identify the dress' colors from a complete color gamut. The results showed three peaks corresponding to the main descriptive categories, providing additional evidence that the brain resolves the image into one of three stable percepts. We hypothesize that these reflect different internal priors: some people favor a cool illuminant (blue sky), discount shorter wavelengths, and perceive white/gold; others favor a warm illuminant (incandescent light), discount longer wavelengths, and see blue/black. The remaining subjects may assume a neutral illuminant, and see blue/brown. We show that by introducing overt cues to the illumination, we can flip the dress color.

SUBMITTER: Lafer-Sousa R

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4921196 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Striking individual differences in color perception uncovered by 'the dress' photograph.

Lafer-Sousa Rosa R Hermann Katherine L KL Conway Bevil R BR

Current biology : CB 20150514 13

'The dress' is a peculiar photograph: by themselves the dress' pixels are brown and blue, colors associated with natural illuminants, but popular accounts (#TheDress) suggest the dress appears either white/gold or blue/black. Could the purported categorical perception arise because the original social-media question was an alternative-forced-choice? In a free-response survey (N = 1401), we found that most people, including those naïve to the image, reported white/gold or blue/black, but some sai ...[more]

PMID: 25981795

Similar Datasets

Project description:Previous reports that the sensitivity to the bitter tasting substance 6-n-propylthiouracil (PROP) is related to the sensitivity to other tastes, to chemical irritants, and to fats and oils have led to adoption of PROP as a measure of general oral sensitivity and as a predictor of dietary habits that could impact health. The results, however, have not been consistent. It was recently discovered that the ability to perceive "thermal taste" (i.e., sweetness from thermal stimulation alone) was associated with higher responsiveness to 4 prototypical taste stimuli but not to PROP. This finding implied that individual differences in taste perception are determined in large part by factors other than those related to genetic expression of the PROP receptor. The present study followed up this observation by comparing individual differences in perception of 4 prototypical taste stimuli (sucrose, NaCl, citric acid, and quinine) and PROP under conditions that also enabled assessment of the reliability of individual intensity ratings of taste. Creaminess ratings of 3 milk products that had different fat contents were also collected to investigate further the relationship between taste and oral somatosensory perception. The results showed that intensity ratings across 2 trials were significantly correlated for all 5 taste stimuli and that averaging across replicates led to significant correlations among the 4 prototypical stimuli. In contrast, the bitterness of PROP was correlated only with the bitterness of quinine. None of the taste stimuli, including PROP, was significantly correlated with ratings of creaminess. These results imply 1) that with the exception of PROP, as few as 2 intensity ratings of common taste stimuli can reveal individual differences in overall taste perception and 2) that any relationship between taste and oral sensation is too weak to be detected under the same conditions. Accordingly, the results support other evidence that the genetic factors which determine the ability to perceive PROP do not play a major role in overall taste and oral somatosensory perception.

Project description:Extensive research documents the existence of egocentric biases in the perception and application of justice norms. The origin of these biases remains poorly understood. We investigated both inter- and intra-individual differences in egocentric justice biases. Participants played an ultimatum game presumably with different anonymous players (simulated by a computer) in which they contributed differentially to the joint production of the initial endowment. We examined how contributions (low vs. high) affect proposers' offers and responders' acceptance decisions, as well as their fairness judgments and their emotional reactions to different types of offers (equal, equitable, unfair, and hyperfair). An egocentric bias in proposers' offers (indicating more flexible preferences) was found only in individualists and not in prosocials, suggesting differences in the motivations (or cognitions) underlying their choice of justice norms. Responders also showed egocentric biases in their judgments of fairness and in their emotional reactions to equal and equitable offers, but not in their acceptance decisions. Such dissociation might suggest that some form of emotion regulation occurred. Responders may evaluate offers on valence dimensions (e.g., goal conduciveness/outcome favorability and norm compatibility/justice) that are multiply interacting and potentially conflicting. The individual's acceptance/rejection decision reflects the relative weight attributed to competing appraisals. For this overt behavioral decision, the (personal) appraisal of outcome favorability that drives (analytical) acceptance of goal-conducive outcome seems to be stronger than the (social) appraisal of outcome fairness, which may trigger covert (emotional) rejection of offers that are incompatible with justice norms. Our data show that the emotional reaction patterns provide a more fine-grained readout of the overall evaluation of the proposer's action, the underlying emotional dynamics of which may, in real life, strongly determine future interactions with specific partners. Further research on the relationship between emotion and behavior in economic games is needed to explore potential dissociations and long-term effects.

Dataset Information

Striking individual differences in color perception uncovered by 'the dress' photograph.

Publications

Striking individual differences in color perception uncovered by 'the dress' photograph.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure