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 compl

SUBMITTER: Lafer-Sousa R 

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

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature