LAUSR

Non-synesthetes exhibit a tendency to associate specific shapes with particular colors (i.e., circle-red, triangle-yellow, and square-blue). Here, we used two Go/No-go tasks to examine the congruency priming effect of color-shape associations on recognition efficiency of color and shape features. At the beginning of each trial, a target color or shape word was introduced, followed by a colored-shape visual stimulus. Participants were required to press a key to a target stimulus ("go" cues), while withholding their responses to a non-target stimulus ("no-go" cues). The targets were presented either visually (visual word, Experiment 1) or auditorily (spoken word, Experiment 2). Results showed a congruency effect of color-shape associations on recognition efficiency for color and shape features in both experiments. Response times were shorter in congruent than incongruent conditions, that a target could be recognized faster when it was presented with the congruent visual features than with incongruent ones, irrespective of the presentation form (visual or auditory). These results suggest that color-shape associations can be strong to influence visual recognition of color and shape features.