Favourite hues linked to visual acuity

THE eagle-eyed among us rally to red, and the Mr. Magoos are wooed by blue. So says Diana Derval of the market research firm DervalResearch, whose newest findings are based in neuroendocrinological science. Professor Derval, who says her research shows that visual acuity determines our favourite and least favourite colours, presented these findings at the Association for Research on Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO) conference in January. According to DervalResearch, nearsighted people – those with myopia – tend to prefer short-wave colours like blue, whereas farsighted folks (hyperopia) gravitate to long-wave colours such as red.

It’s all a matter of simple physics. Each colour refracts differently; in other words, colours hit different places on the retina according to their wavelength. Short-wave colours such as blue and violet target the front, whereas long-wave colours such as red and yellow hit the back. The focal point of the eye is the place where all colour waves meet after passing the lens, but the exact location of the focal point varies among individuals.

“Because nearsighted people focus light closer to the front of the retina,” explains Professor Derval, “watching blue colours is effortless for them. To perceive red colours, on the other hand, they have to tense the ocular muscles.”

Conversely, farsighted people have a shorter eyeball and the focal point is beyond the retina. Looking at red is easy on their eyes, whereas gazing at blue requires that they tense the ocular muscles. People tend to gravitate towards the colours that relax them, Professor Derval says.

DervalResearch conducted the research on men and women of – Chinese, Caucasian, African, and Middle-Eastern. Professor Derval found the correlation between visual acuity and colour preference to be slightly stronger in women than in men.

NeuromarketingDervalResearch is riding the wave of a brave new trend in “neuromarketing,” which combines cutting-edge neuroscience with marketing research. And there’s a lot more to the research than simply determining people’s colour preferences based on their visual aberrations.

The market research firm’s findings also target those other four senses: taste, touch, smell, and hearing. Most intriguingly, there is a hormonal connection to all of this sensory research; that’s the “endocrinological” part. “Consumers are unique individuals but they are also predictable,” says Professor Derval. "Their preferences and behaviour are directly linked to their biological and sensory perceptions. And these perceptions are greatly due to the influence of prenatal hormones."

Drawing upon thousands of measurements in over 25 countries, the company says it developed a powerful and predictive biological segmentation tool: the Hormonal Quotient (HQ). “We have discovered that people’s perception of products and services – via their taste buds, hair cells in the inner ear, rod and cone cells in the eyes, and skin sensors – is linked to their Hormonal Quotient,” she says. “Knowing consumers’ HQ makes it possible to predict not only their favourite colours, but also their preferred tastes, smells, shapes, textures, and sounds.”
The HQ tool was developed by studying over 50 target groups, including top executives, housewives, entrepreneurs, purchasing managers, and opinion leaders. From this Derval was able to determine eight different HQ profiles. Applied properly, Professor Derval says, these profiles will allow firms to design and deliver the right consumer experience across their markets in a very cost-effective way, predicting consumers’ sensory perceptions, purchasing behaviour, and product preferences based on their biological profiles. “Companies no longer need to conduct traditional, recurrent, and costly surveys,” she says. “They just have to identify the profile and HQ of their consumers once.”

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