2024 Volume 36 Issue 2 Pages 61-71
Color assimilation is an optical illusion causing the color appearance of a center region biases toward the color of its surroundings. The extent of contribution of optical and neural factors to this illusion is unclear. This study investigated the frequency of color assimilation with various surrounding hues and its relation to luminance contrast. We carried out optical simulations to understand the eye-related factors like light scattering and chromatic aberration, then compared these with the observed illusory effect. It was found that color assimilation was more likely to occur with blue and yellow surroundings than with red. Additionally, we noticed a preference for a brighter central region when the surrounding was red, and darker when it was blue. These findings align with our simulations, suggesting that optical factors largely influence the hue dependencies of color assimilation.
