Shades of Difference

Introduction

Review of Literature

Dissemination of Research

Technology Issues and Decisions

Phase I: Color Preference Test

Phase II: Shades of Difference

Phase III: Website Preferences

Phase IV: Alternative Presentations of Identical Content

Conclusions

Bibliography

  

Phase II | Experiment Design

Experiment Design

Introduction

With blue being the overwhelming color preference in Phase 1, Phase 2 extended the research by examining if the shade of blue influenced color preference. Six shades of blue ranging from very light to very dark (#CCFFFF, #99CCFF, #33CCFF, #0066CC, #000099, and #000066) were chosen. The colors of the moonscape and technopets websites used in Phase 1 were changed to these colors. Undergraduate ITI students again were used as test subjects.

For moonscape, males overwhelmingly preferred one of the deeper shades, #000099, while females were evenly divided between the darkest and the next lightest shades (#99CCFF and #000066). Technopet results were significantly different with both males and females preferring the darker mid-range colors (#0066CC and #000099).

Research by (Chattapadhyay, Gorn, & Darke) somewhat supports these findings in that males generally prefer more richly saturated colors than females.

Websites Designed for the Experiment
                   Moonscape
                   Technopet

Project C.O.P.E.: Content, Organization, Preference, Evaluation
Principal Investigator: Kay E. Vandergrift, Professor
Research Team: Janet Hilbun, Ph.D. Student and Graduate Assistant; Lin Lin, Ph.D. Student and Teaching Assistant; Alex Daley, Manager, Information Technology Services; Jane Anne Hannigan, Professor Emerita, Columbia University, Consultant (Members of the team conducting the actual research have passed the Human Subjects Certification Program)
Photography: Lin Lin
School of Communication, Information and Library Studies, SCILS - Rutgers University