The color black and situational context: Factors influencing perception of an individual's aggressiveness and respectability

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Authors	LINHARTOVÁ Pavla ŤÁPAL Adam BRABENEC Luboš MACEČEK Radomír BUCHTA Jan Jiří PROCHÁZKA Jakub JEŽEK Stanislav VACULÍK Martin
Year of publication	2013
Type	Article in Periodical
Magazine / Source	Studia psychologica: an international journal of research and theory in psychological sciences
MU Faculty or unit	Faculty of Social Studies
Citation
Web	http://psychologia.sav.sk/sp/index.php?id=abstract&numid=646
Field	Psychology
Keywords	aggressiveness; respectability; perception; black color; context
Description	The article is focused on the influence of black colored clothing and situational context on impression formation. We examined whether individuals are evaluated as more aggressive (1) when they are wearing black clothing, (2) in an aggressive situational context. Furthermore, we examined whether individuals are evaluated as more respectable (1) when they are wearing black clothing (2) in more respectable situational context. The sample consisted of 475 high school students who assessed individuals displayed in computer-modified photographs wearing randomly chosen colors in randomly chosen contexts. We show that men unlike women are evaluated as more aggressive when wearing the color black. Black colored clothing does not have influence on the assessment of one’s respectability. Both men and women are evaluated as more aggressive in aggressive situational contexts and also as more respectable in more respectable situational contexts regardless of the color of their clothing.