If you want your next presentation to be a home run, don't wear a red shirt to the meeting don't even sit next to someone else wearing red tie. University of Rochester researchers say the color red has such a deep association with failure and error for most people in our culture that even getting a glimpse of the color before taking a test or performing an important task can profoundly affect achievement. To test the theory, the researchers briefly flashed red cards at people right before they took a series of important achievement tests, like IQ or a major exam, and found that even the subtlest exposure to the color led to substantially poorer performance. Even worse, the subjects were unaware that this exposure might contribute to shoddy performance. Brain scans showed that when the red flash cards popped up, the subjects right frontal cortexes went into overdrive, something neuroscientists have long associated with failure and avoidance behaviors. Were conditioned by flashing warning lights, wrong answers on exams and negative balance sheets, so even the slightest hint of crimson seems to stop us in our mental tracks.
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