There Is More Than Meets the Eye

Color's ultimate physical reality is continuous, and yet human beings “cut” this continuum into a rather small number of categories reflected in their languages’ color lexicon. There are striking cross‐linguistic differences in the color lexicon, which are primarily attributed to differences in communicative needs, but also striking commonalities, attributed to a common human perceptual system. Here, we challenge this notion of a uniform perceptual structure by experimentally comparing participants from two populations, French from France and Himba from Namibia. They differ in the amount of exposure to ultraviolet radiation, which influences color perception through its effects on eye physiology cumulatively during the individual's lifetime. We found, even after controlling for potential confounds at the individual, color‐naming, and cultural levels, that color perception is affected by age significantly more in the Himba participants, suggesting that besides communicative needs, perceptual structure can play a dual role, contributing to both cross‐linguistic universals and differences in the color lexicon.

Color vision · Perception · Perceptual system · Problem of universals · Categorization, perception, and language · Color perception and design · Language, Metaphor, and Cognition

• Color naming reflects optimal partitions of color space

  Open Access•Terry Regier, Paul Kay et al.•Proceedings of the National…•2007

  Añadir item

• Kinship Categories Across Languages Reflect General Communicative Principles

  Open Access•Candace Kemp, Charles Kemp et al.•Science•2012

  Añadir item

• The Development of Academic Achievement and Cognitive Abilities

  Open Access•Peng Peng, Rogier Kievit•Child Development Perspectives•2020

  Añadir item

• The weirdest people in the world?

  Open Access•J Henrich, Steven J Heine et al.•Behavioral and Brain Sciences•2010

  Añadir item

• LmerTest Package

  Open Access•Alexandra Kuznetsova, Per B Brockhoff et al.•Journal of Statistical Software•2017

  Añadir item

• Color categories

  Open Access•Dawne Roberson, Debi Roberson et al.•Cognitive Psychology•2004

  Añadir item

• Language is not isolated from its wider environment

  Open Access•Dan Dediu, Rick Janssen et al.•Language & Communication•2017

  Añadir item

• Color vision and color naming

  Marc H Bornstein•Psychological Bulletin•1973

  Añadir item

• The Linguistic Significance of the Meanings of Basic Color Terms

  Paul Kay, Chad K Mcdaniel•Language•1978

  Añadir item

• What Is the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis

  Open Access•Paul Kay, Willett Kempton•American Anthropologist•1984

  Añadir item