Cargando…
The Biological Basis of a Universal Constraint on Color Naming: Cone Contrasts and the Two-Way Categorization of Colors
Many studies have provided evidence for the existence of universal constraints on color categorization or naming in various languages, but the biological basis of these constraints is unknown. A recent study of the pattern of color categorization across numerous languages has suggested that these pa...
Autores principales: | , , , |
---|---|
Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Public Library of Science
2011
|
Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3177860/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21977226 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0024994 |
_version_ | 1782212342814081024 |
---|---|
author | Xiao, Youping Kavanau, Christopher Bertin, Lauren Kaplan, Ehud |
author_facet | Xiao, Youping Kavanau, Christopher Bertin, Lauren Kaplan, Ehud |
author_sort | Xiao, Youping |
collection | PubMed |
description | Many studies have provided evidence for the existence of universal constraints on color categorization or naming in various languages, but the biological basis of these constraints is unknown. A recent study of the pattern of color categorization across numerous languages has suggested that these patterns tend to avoid straddling a region in color space at or near the border between the English composite categories of “warm” and “cool”. This fault line in color space represents a fundamental constraint on color naming. Here we report that the two-way categorization along the fault line is correlated with the sign of the L- versus M-cone contrast of a stimulus color. Moreover, we found that the sign of the L-M cone contrast also accounted for the two-way clustering of the spatially distributed neural responses in small regions of the macaque primary visual cortex, visualized with optical imaging. These small regions correspond to the hue maps, where our previous study found a spatially organized representation of stimulus hue. Altogether, these results establish a direct link between a universal constraint on color naming and the cone-specific information that is represented in the primate early visual system. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-3177860 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2011 |
publisher | Public Library of Science |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-31778602011-10-04 The Biological Basis of a Universal Constraint on Color Naming: Cone Contrasts and the Two-Way Categorization of Colors Xiao, Youping Kavanau, Christopher Bertin, Lauren Kaplan, Ehud PLoS One Research Article Many studies have provided evidence for the existence of universal constraints on color categorization or naming in various languages, but the biological basis of these constraints is unknown. A recent study of the pattern of color categorization across numerous languages has suggested that these patterns tend to avoid straddling a region in color space at or near the border between the English composite categories of “warm” and “cool”. This fault line in color space represents a fundamental constraint on color naming. Here we report that the two-way categorization along the fault line is correlated with the sign of the L- versus M-cone contrast of a stimulus color. Moreover, we found that the sign of the L-M cone contrast also accounted for the two-way clustering of the spatially distributed neural responses in small regions of the macaque primary visual cortex, visualized with optical imaging. These small regions correspond to the hue maps, where our previous study found a spatially organized representation of stimulus hue. Altogether, these results establish a direct link between a universal constraint on color naming and the cone-specific information that is represented in the primate early visual system. Public Library of Science 2011-09-21 /pmc/articles/PMC3177860/ /pubmed/21977226 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0024994 Text en Xiao et al. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Xiao, Youping Kavanau, Christopher Bertin, Lauren Kaplan, Ehud The Biological Basis of a Universal Constraint on Color Naming: Cone Contrasts and the Two-Way Categorization of Colors |
title | The Biological Basis of a Universal Constraint on Color Naming: Cone Contrasts and the Two-Way Categorization of Colors |
title_full | The Biological Basis of a Universal Constraint on Color Naming: Cone Contrasts and the Two-Way Categorization of Colors |
title_fullStr | The Biological Basis of a Universal Constraint on Color Naming: Cone Contrasts and the Two-Way Categorization of Colors |
title_full_unstemmed | The Biological Basis of a Universal Constraint on Color Naming: Cone Contrasts and the Two-Way Categorization of Colors |
title_short | The Biological Basis of a Universal Constraint on Color Naming: Cone Contrasts and the Two-Way Categorization of Colors |
title_sort | biological basis of a universal constraint on color naming: cone contrasts and the two-way categorization of colors |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3177860/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21977226 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0024994 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT xiaoyouping thebiologicalbasisofauniversalconstraintoncolornamingconecontrastsandthetwowaycategorizationofcolors AT kavanauchristopher thebiologicalbasisofauniversalconstraintoncolornamingconecontrastsandthetwowaycategorizationofcolors AT bertinlauren thebiologicalbasisofauniversalconstraintoncolornamingconecontrastsandthetwowaycategorizationofcolors AT kaplanehud thebiologicalbasisofauniversalconstraintoncolornamingconecontrastsandthetwowaycategorizationofcolors AT xiaoyouping biologicalbasisofauniversalconstraintoncolornamingconecontrastsandthetwowaycategorizationofcolors AT kavanauchristopher biologicalbasisofauniversalconstraintoncolornamingconecontrastsandthetwowaycategorizationofcolors AT bertinlauren biologicalbasisofauniversalconstraintoncolornamingconecontrastsandthetwowaycategorizationofcolors AT kaplanehud biologicalbasisofauniversalconstraintoncolornamingconecontrastsandthetwowaycategorizationofcolors |