Effect of Color Attributes Used in Color Adjustment on Display Memory Color Matching

Memory colors are defined as the colors that people typically associate with specific objects, based on their past experiences. This study investigates the effects of two color adjustment methods on memory color matching in a display-based experiment. The experiment used two different methods, one where participants adjusted colors in <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$\mathrm{L}^{*}, \mathrm{a}^{*}, \mathrm{b}^{*}$</tex> attributes (labelled LAB adjustment method in this study) and the other in <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$\mathrm{L}^{*}, \mathrm{C}^{*}, \mathrm{h}$</tex> attributes (labelled LCH adjustment method). Participants adjusted the color patches corresponding to gray images of familiar objects, matching them to their memory colors. Performance consistency between LAB and LCH adjustments was analyzed using t-tests and validation metrics. Results showed that while both methods yielded highly similar memory color matches, LAB adjustments exhibited significantly lower intra-observer variability, indicating a more stable and reliable method for memory color matching. The study concluded that while LCH adjustments were more intuitive, LAB adjustments may offer enhanced stability in experimental setups requiring precise color matching.