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Analise Gates, Acacia Bryson and Ava Stills

Period 3 physics

Design Your Own Wave Experiment:


The Study of Color Wavelength Variation

Abstract:
While studying waves, our group was interested in color - and it's natural
phenomenon. With this interest we decided to study color and how it attracts the human
eye. We did an experiment that consisted of having people look into a dark box that had
a color strip in it and then shown a bright light into the box. After this we asked them
what they saw and recorded their answer. In the end we found that colors with larger
wavelengths are recognized easier than ones with smaller wavelengths. Our results may
not be the most reliable because of problems with our experiments.
Introduction:
The purpose of our experiment is to learn how wave length affects one's initial
reaction to a color. We were fascinated in the phenomenon of color and wanted to
explore deeper into the connection between how wavelength effect pigments. In this
curiosity we decided to look into wavelength and how different wavelengths attract the
human eye. The basic knowledge we had for this was to learn about wavelengths of
colors. In a lab from Live Physics they explain,The order of colors in light, arranged
from shortest wavelength to longest, is called the visible spectrum of light. The image
below shows light's visible spectrum, which runs from violet to red. You might recognize
the spectrum as the order of colors in a rainbow. Also you have to understand that the
human eye can only see the visible spectrum. NASA explains this in an article about
color wavelength. It states, Our eyes are sensitive to light which lies in a very small
region of the electromagnetic spectrum labeled "visible light". This "visible light"
corresponds to a wavelength range of 400 - 700 nanometers (nm) and a color range of
violet through red. The human eye is not capable of "seeing" radiation with wavelengths
outside the visible spectrum. We believe that colors with larger wavelengths be
recognized easier than ones with smaller ones. This is because human eyes have more
sensitivity to red than they do blue and red has a larger wavelength. So because of this
we think larger wavelengths will be easier recognized.
Question and Hypothesis:

How does the variation of wavelength of a color affect ones initial reaction to color?
If the wavelength of a color is larger, the test subject will recognize the color quicker because of
the human eye's sensitivity to red color waves. to certain wavelengths and the sensitivity of
specific colors.

Methods and Materials:


To create this experiment we took a black box and cut a hole in the top of it and also on
two different sides. Then we printed out color swatches from the internet that had a variety of
different color swatches. We cut these into strips so that there were different patterns of color to
look at. We took eight test subjects into a dark room where we had the box setup with the color
strips. These color strips had many different colors on them. The first had green, blue, pink, red,
and yellow. The second had yellow, red, pink, purple, and blue. The third had red, orange, blue,
light, blue, and green. We then had one test subject look into the box where we would turn on a
flashlight quickly and then turn it off quickly. This quick flash of light meant that the test subject
only had a moment to process the color before it went dark again. After this we asked the person
what they saw and we would record that data. We continued these steps and after all eight people
had seen the first strip of paper with colors on it we would change it out and put in the second
and then the third.

Results:
After the experiment we looked at the data we collected and made some conclusions. It seems
that the most recognized colors are red, pink, blue. Red was the most common color seeing as it
was seen in the first two rounds people saw either red or pink which is just a shade of red. In the
third round of the experiment there was an interesting contrast to the results from the first and
second round because every test subject saw either blue or light blue. In the end we found that
red is the most easily recognized color and and that colors with larger wavelengths are seen

easier.

Discussion:
Our results were not the most conclusive because our experiment was not refined
as much as it could have been. Our results were that red was easiestly recognized and
the blue was second. These give some very interesting things to think about because red
and blue are almost opposite on the color spectrum and have very different
wavelengths. If we were to do it again we would have had more colored strips that very
which colors are in the middle. If we had done this we could have gotten data that was
more reliable. The problem with our experiment is that every color every one saw was
either in the very middle or one to the side of the middle. This made it so that our data
was not as accurate as it could have been and we cant say that our results were
completely correct.

Bibliography:

Sources: http://science-edu.larc.nasa.gov/EDDOCS/Wavelengths_for_Colors.html
http://www.livephysics.com/physical-constants/optics-pc/wavelength-colors/
https://www.itp.uni-hannover.de/~zawischa/ITP/introcol.html

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