Results & Conclusions

This section discusses the results of the surveys and interactive experiments that show how music affects color choice. Surveys and interactive experiments support the following conclusions:

• Individuals correlate color with music. In the simple, one-answer survey where individuals were asked to note the first color they thought of when they read the name of a particular genre of music, certain colors where chosen more often than others. For example, in Figure 2 for Classical music, blue was the choice for 25% of the surveys. In Figure 4 for Reggae, green was chosen 26% of the time. These were the colors people thought of without ever hearing the music. When completely different individuals were exposed to the actual genres of music through the interactive experiment, not having been told which genre they were listening to, those same colors were chosen in high numbers as well. For Reggae, green was used 36% of the time and in Classical, blue was chosen 22% of the time. These colors still had high numbers regardless of whether the music was involved or not (see Figure 1 and Figure 3). Additionally, the Techno genre had a high percentage of black in both the survey and experiment and Jazz/Big Bandhad considerably high percentages of blue and green (See Figures 7,8,9 and 10). Individuals correlated colors with music whether they actually heard the music or not. Oftentimes, similar colors were more prevalent than others.

• Music directly affects an individual's color choices. In addition to the survey, an interactive experiment was conducted with the same genres of music noted in the survey. The interactive experiment required individuals to listen to the genres of music, without being told what they were, and express whatever they wished in the Microsoft Paint program. Similar colors were chosen for the same categories of music even though individuals that completed the written survey were different than those given the interactive experiment. In Figure 9 and Figure 10 for Jazz/Big Band, the colors red, yellow green and blue were chosen over half the time with blue and green top choices at 41% in both the survey and experiment. However, red and yellow choices declined considerably from the survey to the experiments and the color purple increased from 8% to 19% in the interactive experiment. Similar changes can be seen in the Pop, Techno and Alternative genres in Figures 5, 6, 7, 8 and Figures 11 and 12.

• Digital art (or any art) may be affected by musical influence. Color choice, while creating art, is affected when music is introduced as shown in comparisons of interactive experiments to written surveys in the pie chart figures. Some color choices remain notably constant while others change drastically. The following figures show a percentage of the time that each color was used. Oftentimes, color is automatically associated with certain music because of commercial advertising and stereotypical influences. In this research, surveys were conducted without music and individuals quickly associated a color with a certain genre of music. However, when individuals were exposed to different genres of music while creating art in the Microsoft Paint program, many color choices were different from what one might expect. In Figure 12, red, purple and gray were the predominant color choices for the survey. In the actual experiment, red continued to have high numbers compared to some, but gray, black and yellow were the predominant colors. Black moved from 13% in the survey to 17% in the experiment and yellow increased from 3% to 14% (See Figure 11 and Figure 12). Different pitches and sounds affect color choice, as described in "Color Music" by Michael Poast. Because higher notes and lower notes affect color choice in many ways, it is reasonable to see how art can be affected by musical influences. This can be seen in the Classical and Pop music pie charts on Figures 1 and 2 and Figures 5 and 6 out of the Appendix. Yellow and pink were popular colors in the Classical and Pop music genres. Both of these musical choices had high notes and upbeat sounds.

The results of our research showed that while creating art, an individual's choice of color is affected by music. Color choices are often associated with the characteristics of a particular genre of music. Individuals do correlate color and music. Color and the cochlear correlation of music does exist because our brains do interpret sound as color and color is additionally interpreted as sound.

Below are Figures 1 and 2 for the Classical interactive experiment and survey. For the figures showing results from all music genres, please see the PDF of the Research Paper.