The relationship between the color of traffic signal and visual structure

At present, the traffic lights are red, green and yellow. Red means stop, green means go, yellow means wait (i.e. prepare). But a long time ago, there were only two colors: red and green. As the traffic reform policy became more and more perfect, another color was added later, yellow; Then another traffic light was added. In addition, the increase of color is closely related to people’s psychological reaction and visual structure.

The human retina contains rod-shaped photoreceptor cells and three kinds of cone-shaped photoreceptor cells. The rod-shaped photoreceptor cells are particularly sensitive to yellow light, while the three kinds of cone-shaped photoreceptor cells are sensitive to red light, green light and blue light respectively. In addition, people’s visual structure makes it easy for people to distinguish between red and green. Although yellow and blue are not difficult to distinguish, because the photoreceptor cells in the eyeball are less sensitive to blue light, red and green are selected as the lamp colors.

As for the setting source of traffic light color, there is also a more rigorous reason, that is, according to the principle of physical optics, the red light has a very long wavelength and strong transmission, which is more attractive than other signals. Therefore, it is set as the traffic signal color for traffic. As for the use of green as the traffic signal color, it is because the difference between green and red is large and it is easy to distinguish, and the color blind coefficient of these two colors is low.

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In addition, there are other factors besides the above reasons. Because the color itself has symbolic significance, the meaning of each color has its own characteristics. For example, red gives people a strong passion or intense feeling, followed by yellow. It makes people feel cautious. Therefore, it can be set as the red and yellow traffic light colors having the meaning of prohibiting traffic and danger. Green means gentle and quiet.

And green has a certain alleviating effect on eye fatigue. If you read books or play computer for a long time, your eyes will inevitably feel tired or a little astringent. At this time, if you turn your eyes to the green plants or objects, your eyes will have an unexpected feeling of comfort. Therefore, it is appropriate to use green as the traffic signal color with traffic significance.

As mentioned above, the original traffic signal color is not arbitrarily set, and there is a certain reason. Therefore, people use red (representing danger), yellow (representing early warning) and green (representing safety) as the colors of traffic signals. Now it is also continuing to use and move towards a better traffic order system.


Post time: Aug-16-2022