How men and women see colors

SHE SAYS: “Honey, which shade of blue do you prefer? Aqua, cobalt or navy?”

HE SAYS: “Huh? They all look the same to me.”

It’s now a scientific fact! Men and women do not see colors the same way because the male and female brains process information about color differently.

While men are more attuned to seeing fine detail and objects that move rapidly, women are better at differentiating between colors, reports HealthDay News of a study conducted by researchers at Brooklyn College and Hunter College of the City University of New York.

Study participants, all of whom were over the age of 16, had normal color vision and perfect 20/20 vision (either natural or corrected), were asked to view and identify colors across the spectrum from red to violet.

The results:

  • In order for men to see the same color hue as women, they had to view a slightly longer wavelength.
  • Men had more trouble than women discerning specific colors in the center of the spectrum.
  • Men were better able than women to see images that changed rapidly.

“As with other senses, such as hearing and the olfactory system, there are marked sex differences in vision between men and women,” study leader Israel Abramov said in a news release.

Color naming: men keep it simple

What may be simply “purple” to a man, could be grape, plum or any other fruit-like variant to a woman.

How men and women see colors