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UNIT 7

Focus on Vocabulary Colorful Idioms

1.Read the statements below and try to decide if they are true or false. Discuss your ideas with another student.

1.Green dyes in sweets make people feel ill.

2.Food manufacturers think that colour dyes make their products more appealing.

3.The British like tinned vegetables to be a bright colour.

4.Both Americans and Britons like apples, which are bright red.

5.There is no scientific evidence that colours can have an effect on the nervous system.

6.The colour blue can make us feel calm.

7.The colour red is used by fast food chains to encourage customers to stay in their restaurants.

8.People also judge a cleaning product like soap powder by its colour.

2. Now read the text and say whether the statements are true or false according to the writer. If you think a statement is false, be prepared to say why.

Your true colours

Seeing red can quite literally make you 'see red'. It can also make you eat faster. Colour influences the mind in mysterious ways, and those who wish to influence you - to make you buy their products, or work harder -often do so with colour. But you

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can make this process work to your advantage. Go through the spectrum with Paul Kerton and Deirdre Mc Quillan; then use our colour test to show you the finer shades of your personality and your temperament.

The marketing world is full of folklore about consumer reactions to colour how, for example; too much green on a confectionery wrapper is a recipe for disaster. For years, the food industry insisted that without its handy 'azo' dyes the public would find processed produce unappetizing. Yet colour preference can often sound like a mix of fad and cultural custom, especially when the French will eat grey tinned peas and beans, while the British will not, and we prefer green apples to the Americans' glossy red. However, there is more to colour than meets the eye.

This, at least, is the view of light researcher John Ott, who has discovered that colour may directly affect our nervous systems.

The idea that colour can affect the nervous system in some way seems strengthened by the fact that experiments have recorded raised blood pressure in red surroundings and lowered blood pressure in blue surroundings. Red evokes subjective reactions of increased energy and hunger;

blue evokes tranquility and relaxation. Whether knowingly or otherwise, fast food chains have cleverly exploited the effects of seeing red. As well as making people hungry, red and its close relation, orange, cause time to seem to pass more quickly and influence people to feel in a hurry. By using these colours, places like Mc Donald's create an atmosphere, which increases the appetite but subtly dissuades the customer from hanging around for very long.

Colour has also been used to striking effect in the marketing of consumer products. A group of homemakers was once

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asked to test samples of identical soap powder in three different boxes, one yellow, one blue and one a mix of blue and yellow. Extraordinary results ensued:

the powder in the yellow packet was judged to be so powerful that some said it had damaged their clothes, while the blue was said to be so weak that it left stains behind: the powder in the mix of blue and yellow was assessed as just right. Yet the only difference was in the colour of the packet.

Vocabulary

To influence-влиять

Advantage-преимущество

Blood pressure-кровяное давление

3. Now answer questions 1-8 by choosing from the colours in sections A-H of the text. Some choices may be required more than once. When more than one answer is required, these may be given in any order.

A Red

Red represents passion and energy. Red in the first position means you are impulsive, sexy and have a will to win. You are a good leader. You want to expand your horizons and live life to the full. Red in the seventh or eighth position means your desire for life and thirst for adventure have become less.

B Yellow

Yellow represents happiness and relaxation. Anyone who chooses yellow in second, third or fourth place is a positive, optimistic person who always looks to the future - never backwards. You find life easy, and problems simply do not exist for you. Free from worry, you lead a carefree life; but this does not mean that you are lazy. You can be extremely hardworking, although not consistently. Yellow in first place means that you are ambitious and eager to please. When yellow is in the latter part of the spectrum you have had your hopes and dreams dashed and you feel isolated and disappointed, often becoming defensive and withdrawn.

C Green

Green represents firmness and resistance to change. In first place, you are persistent, possessive and quite selfish. You are a high-achiever and an accumulator of 'things' - like a penthouse, a BMW, a Rolex, a holiday flat, a compact-disc player. You want to be recognized and need to impress but worry about the prospect of failure. If green is a later choice, your ego has been bruised and you have been humbled by the resistance to your progress. Consequently you can be highly critical, sarcastic and stubborn.

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D Violet

A mixture of red and blue, violet represents a conflict between impulsiveness and calm sensitivity, dominance and submissiveness. The person who prefers violet wants to find a mystical, magical relationship. Both mentally and physically immature, you are stuck in a dream world of wishful thinking and fantasy. Often violet is chosen by adolescents who still see the world through fairy-tale eyes. When violet appears in the latter part of the sequence, it indicates that the person choosing it is more mature and has outgrown the 'fantasy' vision of life, confronting harsh reality head-on.

E Brown

Brown is the colour of physical well-being and is an indicator of how healthy you think you are. If you put brown in fourth or fifth place you are not very concerned about your health and body. This means that you are probably in good shape. Those worried about illness tend to put brown earlier in their sequence. If you choose brown as your favourite colour, you are restless and insecure. If brown is in eighth place, you don't care enough for your body: you may not be as healthy as you think. Placing brown early also indicates the importance of a secure environment: refugees often pick brown first.

F Grey

Grey is a neutral and represents a point between two contrasting and conflicting motivations. Grey in the first position means that you want to shut yourself off from everything and remain uncommitted, so that you can swing with opinion and emotions. You hate joining anything with 'group' connotations and are an observer rather than a doer. Those who choose grey in the eighth position seek to join in with everything, eager and enthusiastic. Such people will try absolutely everything in their efforts to achieve their goals.

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