Color of Happiness

Feeling blue? Seeing red? Green with envy? I prefer color me happy!

Sunny yellow, tangerine orange and cotton candy pink all are colors that I think of when I think of the word "happy". What words come to mind when you think color me happy?

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Different Colors Describe Happiness vs. Depression

The many moods people experience vary just about as much as the different colors people tend to use to describe their moods. The study did find, however, that some moods were more likely to be associated with some colors than others.

People with anxiety or depression were much more likely to associate their mood with the color gray. Happier people preferred yellow to describe their mood. These findings provide doctors with a visual tool that could be used by patients who have trouble communicating verbally.

Color me happy chart of colors showing yellow as the happiest color

Positive and negative ratings for each color by healthy volunteers. The percentage of healthy volunteers who rated each color on the ‘Color Wheel’ as either positive (P) or negative (N) is shown. For example, 72% of participants rated Yellow 14 as positive whereas 0.5% rated it negative in contrast only 1% of volunteers rated Black 33 as positive whereas 74% rated it as negative.

“This is a way of measuring anxiety and depression which gets away from the use of language,” study co-author and gastroenterologist Peter Whorwell of University Hospital South Manchester told LiveScience. “What is very interesting is that this might actually be a better way of capturing the patient’s mood than questions.”

Access the full version of the study at BMC Medical Research

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Kate Smith
Kate Smith is an optimistic, expressive, artist, designer, writer and color fanatic. With her warm and witty style, Kate teaches you to clearly see, understand and be inspired by color. Then she guides you step-by-step to develop your own unique color sense-ability and achieve results you never dreamed possible.
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