Is my "red" your "red"?: Evaluating structural correspondences between color similarity judgments using unsupervised...

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Science
• Neuroscience
• Psychology

Background:

• The subjective experience of sensory perception, or qualia, is fundamental to consciousness studies.
• Comparing qualia structures between individuals can help understand intersubjective equivalence.
• Previous methods often presuppose direct correspondences, limiting comparisons.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and apply an unsupervised method for aligning subjective sensory experience structures.
• To quantitatively investigate the interindividual structural equivalence of color qualia.
• To compare qualia structures between color-neurotypical and color-blind individuals.

Main Methods:

• Collected subjective similarity judgments for 93 colors from participants.
• Employed an unsupervised alignment method based on optimal transport.
• Mapped similarity structures without assuming predefined sensory correspondences (e.g., 'red'-to-'red').

Main Results:

• Successfully aligned the qualia structures of color-neurotypical participants at the group level.
• Demonstrated that qualia structures of color-blind participants could not be aligned with color-neurotypical participants.
• Provided quantitative evidence for structural differences in color perception between groups.

Conclusions:

• Color-neurotypical individuals exhibit relationally equivalent 'red' qualia.
• Color-blind individuals' 'red' qualia are structurally different from those of color-neurotypical individuals.
• The optimal transport method offers a generalizable approach for exploring subjective experience structures across sensory modalities.