Citation

Wolf CG. Proc. Hum. Factors Ergon. Soc. Annu. Meet. 1982; 26(6): 595.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1982, Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, Publisher SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/154193128202600625

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The increasing use of color displays in business, residential, and laboratory settings has resulted in the need for guidelines for the use of different combinations of colors for the display of text. The purpose of this study was to assess the legibility of a number of combinations of text and background colors for the display of text on home television sets and color monitors. The experiment used a list-scanning task. Each combination of text and background color was tested in a separate list. Reading time for each color combination was recorded. In addition, ratings of readability and pleasantness were collected. The results indicated that there were large differences between the legibility of particular color combinations. There was good agreement among subjects and also between performance and subjective measures. The potential usefulness of the methodology for determining general predictive rules for the legibility of color combinations will be discussed.

Language: en