From my desk in my office on the second floor I have the most amazing view of a huge maple tree. It must be 30 metres high, and it is covered in intense yellow leaves. The maroon leaves of the beech tree beside it create a beautiful contrast. A few snowball bushes at ground level have their bright green leaves left, creating a perfect vibrant footnote.
Looking out my window is like taking a big drink of something fresh, strong and intoxicating.
Colour and memory
I have been reading up on how colour affects our ability to understand and remember information.
More attention = better retention
Pretty obvious, but I’ll say it anyway…
If we pay attention to information, then we are more likely to remember that information.
Colour = more attention
We pay more attention when information is presented in colour.
Colour is considered one of the most essential visual experiences for human beings. Throughout the history of humans’ evolution, colour recognition has played an important role in skills such as way-finding, foraging for food, and recognising predator and prey. (1). Humans learnt to pay attention to colour! (2)
When researchers compared the effect of colour and non-colour multimedia presentations, they found that the presentations with colour had attracted more attention than the non-coloured presentations. (3)
Studies have shown that recognition accuracy is higher for colour images than those in black and white. This was true when participants were tested immediately after looking at the images, and when they were tested one week later. (4)
Red means “important”
More specifically, warm colours such as yellow, red and orange have a greater effect on attention than blues, violets and greys. (5) This is probably because these warm, bold colours put us into a higher state of alertness than cool colours. (6)
Recently I used this information to in my battle against my smart phone addiction. I changed the colour scheme to greyscale, so there is just a hint of colour left. I can report that it is much less interesting to look at, and the little red message alerts are not half as tantalising now that they are grey.
These two examples show the difference between a) a lot of blue with highlights in red, and b) a lot of red with highlights in blue. Which one is most effective at focusing your attention on the important information?
Contrast
Although colour helps to get our attention, it seems like contrast is important too. It makes documents more readable, which increases our chances of remembering something. After all, if you didn’t even read the information, you probably won’t remember information.
How can we use colour to help people remember information?
- Use colour
- Use it consistently
- Use warm colours for the most important information
- Use high contrast for this too
- Use white space to let the information stand out
Colour in graphic recording
Graphic recording is all about getting people’s attention, and presenting information in a way that will help them remember the points. It also aims to create a document that is in line with the clients branding, which includes colours. You can see a bunch of examples in my portfolio.
Here’s a fun article about using colour for better meetings.
References
1. Spence I, Wong P, Rusan M, Rastegar N. How color enhances visual memory for natural scenes. Psychol Sci. 2006 Jan;17(1):1-6
2. Calvo Ivanovic, Ingrid, Cecchi, Marta, Galasso, Clorinda, Borin, Ambra, Mastrantoni, Claudia, Scagnoli, Martina. The Colours of Individual and Collective Memory: Mnemosphere, a Visual Atlas of Memory, Emotions and Atmosphere of Places. 2021/11/18
3. .Farley FH, Grant AP. Arousal and cognition: Memory for color versus black and white multimedia presentation. J Psychol. 1976;94(1):147–150.
4. Gegenfurtner, Karl, Rieger, Jochem. Sensory and cognitive contributions of color to the recognition of natural scenes. Current Biology, 2000/07/01
5. Pan Y. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. Zhejiang University; 2009. Research on the content-based working memory-driven capture of visual attention and its automaticity.
6.. Jackson MC, Wu CY, Linden DEJ, Raymond JE. Enhanced visual short-term memory for angry faces. J Exp Psychol
Human. 2009;35(2):363–374. doi: 10.1037/a0013895
7. Dzulkifli MA, Mustafar MF. The influence of colour on memory
performance: a review. Malays J Med Sci. 2013 Mar;20(2):3-9. PMID:
23983571; PMCID: PMC3743993
