Why Color Matters: How Color Symbolism And Social Memory Impact Big Black Dog Syndrome

By Amanda Leonard

In my last article about Big Black Dog Syndrome, I detailed tactics for re-homing black dogs and cats during Halloween. The color-based discrimination that black dogs and cats face is so deeply engrained within US culture that it is acted upon unconsciously, and is an unalterable aspect of our culture. However, through education, potential adopters can be made aware of their unintentional biases, increasing the chances that potential adopters will adopt a black dog or cat. Because education is the key to thwarting the negative effects of Big Black Dog (BBD) Syndrome, this article will explore how even from early childhood, concepts of color – in this case, the color black – are engrained within our social memory.

Other posts in this blog series:

Shadows in the Shelter: Tactics to Re-Home Black Dogs and Cats During Halloween

How The Meet Your Match Program Can Combat Big Black Dog Syndrome

Color is the flesh of our visual perception of the world, not its skin (Gabo 1962:96-98). Colors can, and do, signify the differences between life and death, noble and common, pure and impure, and health and sickness. Colors distinguish moieties and clans, directions of the compass, and the exchange values of two otherwise identical strands of beads (Sahlins 1976:12). Color is no small part of the human experience, and it would be unwise to ignore how the symbolism of the color black plays a large part in creating, and perpetuating BBD Syndrome. Unfortunately for black dogs and cats, attaching symbolism to colors is an almost universal cultural phenomenon, and in Western cultures, such as that commonly experienced in the United States, black is associated with negative attributes.

Human development is experiential, and children who are read stories about evil-doers riding black horses, such as the Headless Horseman for example, are enculturated into negative associations with the color black. Social memory is a society’s vicarious beliefs about its past shaped by oral and written accounts passed down through the generations (Crumley 2002; Anderlini, Gerardi, Lagunoff 2009). In a culture where the metaphors of “white is good, and black is bad,” inform the social memory, black dogs come to be seen as more dangerous than their white companions. There are many examples of early enculturation to the metaphor “white is good, and black is bad,” as well as social memory acting to signify black dogs as more dangerous than white dogs, yet two stand out dramatically.

The social memory of black dogs as menacing and intimidating is illustrated in Karen Delise’s 2007 work, The Pitbull Placebo, within which distinct trends in popular dog breeds selected for guarding purposes are detailed. These breeds are often dark in color, or have a range of colors that includes a dark variety. Dark colored guarding, mastiff, or bully breeds seem to be singled out amongst popular breeds for guarding or for other violent activities because dark colored dogs appear more menacing and intimidating and would consequently function more effectively as guard dogs.

An interesting example of how children learn the “white is good, and black is bad” metaphor at a startlingly early age can be found in a study called “Evaluating Responses of Preschool Children to the Colors White and Black” by John Williams, Donna Boswell, and Deborah Best. Their study concluded that a procedure called the Color Meaning Test II provides a reliable index of white-black color bias in preschool age children and that it, and its companion procedure, the Preschool Racial Attitude Measure II, provides useful techniques for the study of color as it relates to race bias in preliterate children (Williams, Boswell, Best 1975:501-508). The study is useful when looking a BBD Syndrome even though it was intended to illustrate the link between early development and racial biases because the study demonstrates that the symbolism of color – and the metaphor that black is bad and white is good – is learned very early in human development.

In the Color Meaning Test II procedure, the child is asked to select between identical drawings of one white and one black animal. For example, the child is shown a picture of a white horse and a black horse, told a brief story, and asked to answer the question at the end of the story. An example of one such story could be, “Bobby’s horse bit him. Bobby’s horse is mean. Which horse belongs to Bobby?” The findings demonstrated a significant color bias that favored white animals and devalued black ones. The study also shows that there was little evidence for change in color-bias with increasing age (Williams, Boswell, and Best 1975:501-508). The Williams, Boswell, and Best study corroborates many semantic differential studies with young adults that have documented the existence of a widespread, cross-cultural tendency toward positive evaluation of the color white relative to the color black (Williams, Boswell, Best 1975:501-508).

Attributing specific traits to colors is a normal aspect of human culture. It just so happens that in the culture that pervades the United States, the color black is assigned many negative attributes, which in turn is harmful to the adoption rates of black dogs and cats. The Williams, Boswell, and Best study demonstrates that children are taught the symbolism of colors at a very early age, and as such, there is no way around the unconscious and deeply engrained associations of the color black as the color of malevolence and evil. However, the social memory of black dogs as menacing and dangerous can be overcome through the dissemination of knowledge about BBD Syndrome. If made knowledgeable about BBD Syndrome, potential adopters will be made conscious of the prejudices they may have been operating under, thereby making them more likely to adopt a black dog or cat.

Similarly, the ASPCA’s Meet Your Match program is an excellent tool with which to use to get potential adopters to not walk right by a black dog or cat because they blend into the dark kennel background, and stop to get to know that animal. By evaluating an animal’s behavior and interests and matching them to an adopter’s lifestyle, the Meet Your Match program brings awareness to the importance of personality over appearance, and is the key to breaking the chain that creates, recreates, and reinforces BBD Syndrome in animal shelters across the United States.

In my next article for this blog series, I will discuss the Meet Your Match program in more detail as it relates to combating Big Black Dog Syndrome.

References

Anderlini, Luca, Dino Gerardi, and Roger Lagunoff. 2010. Social Memory, Evidence, and Conflict. Review of Economic Dynamics 13(3):559-574.

Crumley, C. 2002. Exploring Venues of Social Memory. In Social Memory and History: Anthropological Perspectives. Jacob Climo, and Maria G. Cattell, eds. Walnut Creek, California: Alta Mira Press.

Delise, Karen. 2007. The Pit Bull Placebo: The Media, Myths and Politics of Canine Aggression. Ramsey, NJ: Arbor Books, Inc.
Gabo, Naum. 1991. Of Divers Arts. New York: Pantheon Books.

Sahlins, Marshall. 1976. Colors and Cultures. Semiotica 60:1-22.

Williams, John E., Donna A. Boswell, and Deborah L. Best. 1975. Evaluative Responses of Preschool Children to the Colors White and Black. Child Development 46(2):501-508.

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Amanda Leonard attended graduate school at The George Washington University in Washington, DC where she recently received her Master’s degree in Anthropology. Her research on black dogs has been published in the Kroeber Anthropological Society Papers, a scholarly journal out of the University of California at Berkeley.