A survey was conducted in a care facility for the elderly, involving 216 subjects, to examine variations in their impressions of care workers' uniforms due to different colors. Care workers wore polo shirts of the following 7 colors/tones: white; light red, blue, yellow, and blue-green; dull blue; and dark blue. The results were as follows: (1)The most favorable color/tone was light blue-green, followed by light blue and red. (2)In comparison with the same hue among different tones, light blue was more favorable than dull or dark blue. Light blue was regarded as “clearer, cleaner, easier to move, and more beautiful, sophisticated, familiar, considerate, intellectual, trustworthy, and healing”. (3) 5 factors were extracted through factor analysis: “consideration/healing”, “responsibility/ trust”, “activeness”, “personality”, and “flamboyance”. Among the 7 colors/tones, light blue-green showed the highest favorability, with particularly high scores for “consideration/healing” and “responsibility/trust”.

The authors first identified factors associated with a high degree of formality and factors associated with a low degree of formality, for various clothing designs, patterns, and colors. By combining these factors, the authors then created 32 sample design images and conducted a sensory test of these images utilizing the semantic differential method. The test results demonstrated that degree of body coverage and clothing color strongly impacted on perceptions of “formality”. Next, a trial has been made to correlate the ratings of the created design images with ratings of actual clothing designs. The authors created three formal wear designs, in which a model dressed. Images of each design were converted into four plain color schemes — red, yellow, black, and white — using the 4D-box application. In addition, the authors created a total of 30 sample images with dotted and floral patterns of these colors and repeated the same sensory test. The results indicated that design had the strongest influence on the perception of “formality”. However, factor analysis results were similar, revealing that “formality”, “warmth”, and “potency” were the three factors most strongly correlated with a positive perception.