Color Across the Globe

There are a multitude of problems with creating visualizations that cross cultures. It is a lot easier to create a data point directed at a culture that you were raised in and understand fully. But when trying to relay the same or similar information across cultures, there are many things that you need to keep in mind.

Some things are as simple as the colors that you use, along with images you use. The big thing I think of when I look at color becoming a problem is that I was raised, and so was much of the United States, to look at red as being an angry/negative color. So if you are doing a visualization and red is showing the negative, that would make sense to those of us raised to read red as bad.

But if you want to do that same chart for a Japanese audience, it could stir up problems. In Japanese culture, red represents protection, strength, peace and power. It is also said to scare away evil spirits. A better color to use would be black. Although, black is commonly associated with formality, it may also represent unhappiness, fear, evil, or misfortune.

More simply put would be to look at how we react when we, Americans, react when we see the color red. For example, the stop light. RED – YELLOW – GREEN. Red is an instant single to stop (danger if you cross during red—accident could happen or you could get pulled over by police, for example.)

But in Japan, festivals are often marked with red table clothes and decorations—this brings positive emotions.

When designing for an intercultural audience, you have to take a lot of things into consideration. One would be doing a deep dive on the other culture that you are trying to convey a message to. Another, is that no matter what you do, you are not going to be able to create a visualization that appeases everyone. That is difficult enough to do within your own culture. When you take in all the variables that you will undoubtable find when doing research on another culture, it makes sense to take the common variables and utilize them as best as possible. If dealing with two vastly different cultures that has little to nothing in common, I find it best to create multiple visualizations.