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Encyclopedia of Color Science and Technology pp 1–8Cite as

Color Synesthesia

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Synonyms

Color synaesthesia

Definition

Color synesthesia is a condition in which sensory or cognitive inducers elicit involuntary, atypical, concurrent color experiences.

Marks of Color Synesthesia

Synesthesia is a condition that involves unusual pairings across modalities. In color synesthesia, a sensory or cognitive stimulus such as a grapheme or a sound automatically and involuntarily induces specific color experiences. Various types of color synesthesia have been identified, including calendar-color synesthesia, sound-color synesthesia, taste-color synesthesia, and even fear-color synesthesia. However, the most prevalent form of the condition is grapheme-color synesthesia, where numbers or letters induce highly specific color experiences [1].

One of the marks of grapheme-color synesthesia is that it exhibits test-retest reliability, meaning that the synesthetic colors subjects identify relative to specific stimuli in the initial testing phase are nearly identical to those...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

    Berit Brogaard

  2. Brogaard Lab for Multisensory Research, University of Miami, Miami, FL, USA

    Berit Brogaard

  3. Department of Philosophy, University of Akron, Akron, OH, USA

    Dimitria Electra Gatzia

  4. Department of Philosophy, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX, USA

    Jennifer Matey

Authors
  1. Berit Brogaard
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  2. Dimitria Electra Gatzia
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  3. Jennifer Matey
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Dimitria Electra Gatzia .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Color Science & Imaging Lab, North Carolina State Univ, Raleigh, NC, USA

    Renzo Shamey

Section Editor information

  1. Color research & application, Pennsville, NJ, USA

    Rolf Kuehni

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Brogaard, B., Gatzia, D.E., Matey, J. (2020). Color Synesthesia. In: Shamey, R. (eds) Encyclopedia of Color Science and Technology. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27851-8_112-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27851-8_112-8

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-27851-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-27851-8

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Physics and AstronomyReference Module Physical and Materials ScienceReference Module Chemistry, Materials and Physics

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Chapter history

  1. Latest

    Color Synesthesia
    Published:
    20 October 2019

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27851-8_112-8

  2. Original

    Color Synesthesia
    Published:
    09 April 2015

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27851-8_112-7

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