100:"A few years ago, I mentioned to a friend that I remembered phone numbers by their colour. He said "So you're a synesthete!" I hadn't heard of synesthesia (which means something close to 'sense-fusion') – I only knew that numbers seemed naturally to have colours: five is blue, two is green, three is red… And music has colours too: the key of C# minor is a sharp, tangy yellow, F major is a warm brown..."
51:. Despite the existence of this individual case, the majority of synesthetic associations do not seem to be driven by learning of this sort. Rather, it seems that more frequent letters are paired with more frequent colors, and some meaning-based rules, such as ‘b’ being blue, drive most synesthetic associations.
67:. These results are consistent with another study on the brain functioning of grapheme–color synesthetes. Grapheme–color synesthetes tend to have an increased thickness, volume and surface area of the fusiform gyrus. Furthermore, the area of the brain where word, letter and color processing are located,
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And I was dumbfounded. So I thought, "Well." At that time in my life I was having trouble deciding whether the number two was green and the number six blue, or just the other way around. And I said to my father, "Is the number two green?" and he said, "Yes, definitely. It's green." And then he took a
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I came back from college on a semester break, and was sitting with my family around the dinner table, and – I don't know why I said it – but I said, "The number five is yellow." There was a pause, and my father said, "No, it's yellow-ochre." And my mother and my brother looked at us like, 'this is a
46:
While it is extremely unlikely that any two synesthetes will report the same colors for all letters and numbers, studies of large numbers of synesthetes find that there are some commonalities across letters (e.g., "A" is likely to be red). Early studies argued that grapheme–color synesthesia was not
38:
in which an individual's perception of numerals and letters is associated with the experience of colors. Like all forms of synesthesia, grapheme–color synesthesia is involuntary, consistent and memorable. Grapheme–color synesthesia is one of the most common forms of synesthesia and, because of the
79:
Synesthetes often report that they were unaware their experiences were unusual until they realized other people did not have them, while others report feeling as if they had been keeping a secret their entire lives. Many synesthetes can vividly remember when they first noticed their synesthetic
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These experiences have led to the development of technologies intended to improve the retention and memory of graphemes by individuals without synesthesia. Computers, for instance, could use "artificial synesthesia" to color words and numbers to improve usability. A somewhat related example of
20:
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While synesthetes sometimes report seeing colors projected in space, they do not confuse their synesthetic colors with real colors in the external world. Rather, they report that they are simultaneously aware of the external color and also the internal, synesthetic color:
149:
Thirty years after that, he came to my loft in
Manhattan and he said, "you know, the number four *is* red, and the number zero is white. And," he said, "the number nine is green." I said, "Well, I agree with you about the four and the zero, but nine is definitely not
88:"'One day,' I said to my father, 'I realized that to make an 'R' all I had to do was first write a 'P' and then draw a line down from its loop. And I was so surprised that I could turn a yellow letter into an orange letter just by adding a line.'"
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Individuals with grapheme–color synesthesia rarely claim that their sensations are problematic or unwanted. In some cases, individuals report useful effects, such as aid in memory or spelling of difficult words.
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There has been a lot more research as to why and how synesthesia occurs with more recent technology and as synesthesia has become more well known. It has been found that grapheme–color synesthetes have more
681:
612:
Dixon, M.J., Smilek, D., Wagar, B. & Merikle, P.M. (2004). Alphanumeric-Colour
Synaesthesia: When 7 is Yellow and C is Red. in Gemma A. Calvert, Charles Spence and Barry E. Stein (Eds.)
71:, is where the most significant difference in make-up was found. Though not certain, these differences are thought to be part of the reasoning for the presence of grapheme–color synesthesia.
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Simner, J.; Ward, J.; Lanz, M.; Jansari, A.; Noonan, K.; Glover, L.; Oakley, D.A. (2005). "Non-random associations of graphemes to colours in synaesthetic and non-synaesthetic populations".
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Rich, A.N.; Bradshaw, J.L.; Mattingley, J.B. (2005). "A systematic, large scale study of synaesthesia: Implications for the role of early experience in lexical-colour associations".
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from Jahnke and Emde's book, with light-tan j's, slightly violet-bluish n's, and dark brown x's flying around. And I wonder what the hell it must look like to the students."
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As C relates ... "It is difficult to explain...I see what you see. I know the numbers are in black...but as soon as I recognise the form of a 7 it has to be yellow."
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due to associative learning. However, one recent study has documented a case of synesthesia in which synesthetic associations could be traced back to colored
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Finally, synesthetes are quite precise in the color mappings that they experience, which can lead them to make quite detailed comparisons of their colors:
635:"Quote from Carol Steen Artist and founding member of the American Synesthesia Association in an interview at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology"
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I sometimes use my synaesthesia to help me remember difficult proper names. Here's a Thai chef who wrote a terrific vegetarian cookbook :
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Jäncke, Lutz; Beeli, Gian; Eulig, Cornelia; Hänggi, Jürgen (March 2009). "The neuroanatomy of grapheme–color synesthesia".
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Witthoft, N.; Winawer, N. (2006). "Synesthetic colors determined by having colored refrigerator magnets in childhood".
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208:. (Someone with synesthesia can sometimes distinguish between barely different looking characters in a similar way.)
317:
Day, S.A. (2005), "Some
Demographic and Socio-cultural Aspects of Synesthesia" in L. Robertson & N. Sagiv, ed.,
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Grossenbacher, P.G.; Lovelace, C.T. (2001). "Mechanism of synesthesia: Cognitive and physiological constraints".
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Many synesthetes never realize that their experiences are in any way unusual or exceptional. For example, the
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When I see equations, I see the letters in colors – I don't know why. As I'm talking, I see vague pictures of
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experiences, or when they first learned that such experiences were unusual. Writer and synesthete
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How someone with grapheme–color synesthesia might perceive (not "see") certain letters and numbers
504:"Grapheme-colour synaesthetes show increased grey matter volumes of parietal and fusiform cortex"
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Unfortunately, this method can backfire too, because I confuse similarly colored names easily :
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in their brain. There is evidence of an increased grey matter volume in the left caudal
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204:"computer-aided synesthesia" is using letter coloring in a web browser to prevent
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63:(IPS). There was also found to be an increased grey matter volume in the right
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575:"An interview with Stephanie Morgenstern and Mark Ellis on Remembrance"
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682:"Artificial Grapheme-Color Synesthesia for Wearable Task Support"
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393:"Synaesthesia — A window into perception, thought and language"
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long look at my mother and my brother and became very quiet.
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Synesthesia that associates numbers or letters with colors
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Ninth IEEE International
Symposium on Wearable Computers
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Plouznikoff, N.; Plouznikoff, A.; Robert, J.-M. (2005).
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Synesthesia: Perspectives from
Cognitive Neuroscience
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502:Weiss, Peter H.; Fink, Gereon R. (January 2009).
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142:new game, would you share the rules with us?'"
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198:Cassidy Curtis, "Letter-Color Synaesthesia"
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391:Ramachandran, V.S.; Hubbard, E.M. (2001).
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193:This is especially problematic at parties.
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600:What Do You Care What Other People Think?
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582:P.o.v., A Danish Journal of Film Studies
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547:Blue Cats and Chartreuse Kittens
397:Journal of Consciousness Studies
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84:remembers one early experience:
740:"Grapheme → colour synesthesia"
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473:10.1016/j.cognition.2004.11.003
573:Raskin, Richard (March 2003).
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430:10.1016/S0010-9452(08)70342-3
243:10.1016/S1364-6613(00)01571-0
230:Trends in Cognitive Sciences
32:colored grapheme synesthesia
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661:"Letter-Color Synaesthesia"
43:, one of the most studied.
39:extensive knowledge of the
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616:Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
28:Grapheme–color synesthesia
362:10.1080/02643290500200122
349:Cognitive Neuropsychology
323:Oxford University Press
75:Experiences and reports
549:(W. H. Freeman; 2001)"
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691:. pp. 108–113.
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212:References and notes
168:Vatcharin Bhumichitr
82:Patricia Lynne Duffy
61:intraparietal sulcus
49:refrigerator magnets
92:As does filmmaker
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659:Curtis, Cassidy.
543:Duffy, Patricia.
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744:Numberphile
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106:Nobel prize
57:grey matter
36:synesthesia
770:Categories
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559:2007-03-15
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461:Cognition
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180:Dave
177:Mike
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