Kim et al. (2006)

From Psy3241

Perceptual Interaction Between Real And Synesthetic Colors In this article the perceptual interaction between real and synesthetic colors is examined using participants with color-graphemic synesthesia. People with color-graphemic synesthesia experience consistent and vivid colors after viewing achromatic alphanumeric characters. This article looks at the issues of how real and synesthetic colors interact, and how synesthetes see the real and concurrent synesthetic color at the same time. Other issues include how one can see two colors in the same location, and what the relationship is between synesthesia and imagery.

In the first experiment, the influence that real and synesthetic colors play on the perceived direction of apparent motion was examined. In the interaction condition, the first frame was shown which was non-inducing, and physically colored. SHortly after a second frame was shown which was achromatic with different characters. The results showed that synesthetes were experiencing the illusion of motion as the first frame had real red objects in it and the second frame had synesthetically red colored objects which gave them the illusion of motion they were seeing.

In the second experiment, the interaction between real and synesthetic colors that results in binocular rivalry was examined. Binocular rivalry is when two different images compete for perceptual dominance. In this experiment they were looking for the rivalry between real and synesthetic colors. In the interaction condition both LR and WO perceived the real color and synesthetic color during binocular rivalry. This observation of the grouping of real and synesthetic colors together was comparable to the grouping between synesthetic colors and the grouping of actual colors.

The results show that their is a significant interaction between the real and synesthetic colors during perceptual grouping. Also, the interaction between real and synesthetic colors result in a perception in specific motion and character grouping. Link to article

See also: Synesthesia