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Is Red the New Black? A Quasi-Experimental Study Comparing Perceptions of Differently Coloured Cycle Lanes

Cities and road authorities in many countries have started colouring their cycle lanes. Some road authorities choose red, some blue, and some green. The reasoning behind this choice is not clear, and it is uncertain whether some colours are superior to others. The current study aims to examine wheth...

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Autores principales: Karlsen, Katrine, Fyhri, Aslak
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7746616/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33343440
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.554488
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author Karlsen, Katrine
Fyhri, Aslak
author_facet Karlsen, Katrine
Fyhri, Aslak
author_sort Karlsen, Katrine
collection PubMed
description Cities and road authorities in many countries have started colouring their cycle lanes. Some road authorities choose red, some blue, and some green. The reasoning behind this choice is not clear, and it is uncertain whether some colours are superior to others. The current study aims to examine whether coloured cycle lanes are viewed more positively than uncoloured lanes, and whether one of the typically chosen colours is perceived as safer and more inviting to cyclists or more deterring to motorists. Participants were invited to respond to a web survey. Respondents (N = 560) were from the four largest cities in Norway, both genders (42.1% women), and of a wide age range (79.6% between 30 and 70). Depending on cycling frequency, respondents were categorised as either motorist (n = 354) or cyclist (n = 206). All respondents rated different cycle lanes (uncoloured, blue, green, and red) on different attributes. The uncoloured lane was consistently rated least positively, with the lowest scores on visibility, perceived safety for both motorists and cyclist and how inviting it seemed to cycle in the lane. It was also estimated to be the lane that would experience the greatest degree of violation from motorists, in terms of driving or stopping in the cycle lane. The green and red lanes were consistently rated more positively than the blue lane, but whether green or red was preferred depended on whether the respondent had lived a place with coloured cycle lanes. People familiar with coloured cycle lanes, which in Norway are red, rated the red lane more positively than the green lane, while the opposite was true for people who were not used to coloured cycle lanes. The difference in ratings between different colours were similar to, or greater than, the difference from uncoloured to coloured, which implies that it not only matters that a lane is coloured, but also which colour it has.
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spelling pubmed-77466162020-12-19 Is Red the New Black? A Quasi-Experimental Study Comparing Perceptions of Differently Coloured Cycle Lanes Karlsen, Katrine Fyhri, Aslak Front Psychol Psychology Cities and road authorities in many countries have started colouring their cycle lanes. Some road authorities choose red, some blue, and some green. The reasoning behind this choice is not clear, and it is uncertain whether some colours are superior to others. The current study aims to examine whether coloured cycle lanes are viewed more positively than uncoloured lanes, and whether one of the typically chosen colours is perceived as safer and more inviting to cyclists or more deterring to motorists. Participants were invited to respond to a web survey. Respondents (N = 560) were from the four largest cities in Norway, both genders (42.1% women), and of a wide age range (79.6% between 30 and 70). Depending on cycling frequency, respondents were categorised as either motorist (n = 354) or cyclist (n = 206). All respondents rated different cycle lanes (uncoloured, blue, green, and red) on different attributes. The uncoloured lane was consistently rated least positively, with the lowest scores on visibility, perceived safety for both motorists and cyclist and how inviting it seemed to cycle in the lane. It was also estimated to be the lane that would experience the greatest degree of violation from motorists, in terms of driving or stopping in the cycle lane. The green and red lanes were consistently rated more positively than the blue lane, but whether green or red was preferred depended on whether the respondent had lived a place with coloured cycle lanes. People familiar with coloured cycle lanes, which in Norway are red, rated the red lane more positively than the green lane, while the opposite was true for people who were not used to coloured cycle lanes. The difference in ratings between different colours were similar to, or greater than, the difference from uncoloured to coloured, which implies that it not only matters that a lane is coloured, but also which colour it has. Frontiers Media S.A. 2020-12-04 /pmc/articles/PMC7746616/ /pubmed/33343440 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.554488 Text en Copyright © 2020 Karlsen and Fyhri. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Psychology
Karlsen, Katrine
Fyhri, Aslak
Is Red the New Black? A Quasi-Experimental Study Comparing Perceptions of Differently Coloured Cycle Lanes
title Is Red the New Black? A Quasi-Experimental Study Comparing Perceptions of Differently Coloured Cycle Lanes
title_full Is Red the New Black? A Quasi-Experimental Study Comparing Perceptions of Differently Coloured Cycle Lanes
title_fullStr Is Red the New Black? A Quasi-Experimental Study Comparing Perceptions of Differently Coloured Cycle Lanes
title_full_unstemmed Is Red the New Black? A Quasi-Experimental Study Comparing Perceptions of Differently Coloured Cycle Lanes
title_short Is Red the New Black? A Quasi-Experimental Study Comparing Perceptions of Differently Coloured Cycle Lanes
title_sort is red the new black? a quasi-experimental study comparing perceptions of differently coloured cycle lanes
topic Psychology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7746616/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33343440
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.554488
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