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The universalist theory that color cognition is an innate, physiological process rather than a cultural one was started in 1969 by Brent Berlin and Paul Kay in the study detailed in their book Basic Color Terms: Their Universality and Evolution.[2] The study was intended to challenge formerly prevailing theory of linguistic relativity set forth by chief linguistic figures Edward Sapir and Benjamin Lee Whorf in the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis. They found that there are universal restrictions on the number of basic color terms that a language can have and the ways in which the language can employ these terms. The study included data collected from speakers of twenty different languages from a number of different language families. Berlin and Kay identified eleven possible basic color categories: white, black, red, green, yellow, blue, brown, purple, pink, orange, and grey. In order to be considered a basic color category, the term for the color in each language had to meet certain criteria:
It is monolexemic. (for example, blue, but not bluish)
Its signification is not included in that of any other color term. (for example, crimson is a type of red)
Its application must not be restricted to a narrow class of objects. (for example, blonde is restricted to hair, wood)
It must be psychologically salient for informants. (for example, "the color of grandma's freezer" is not psychologically salient for all speakers)
In case of doubt, the following "subsidiary criteria" were implemented:
The doubtful form should have the same distributional potential as the previously established basic color terms. (for example, you can say reddish but not salmonish)
Color terms that are also the name of an object characteristically having that color are suspect, for example, gold, silver and ash.
Recent foreign loan words may be suspect.
In cases where lexemic status is difficult to assess, morphological complexity is given some weight as a secondary criterion. (for example, red-orange might be questionable)
Berlin and Kay also found that, in languages with less than the maximum eleven color categories, the colors found in these languages followed a specific evolutionary pattern. This pattern is as follows:
All languages contain terms for black and white.
If a language contains three terms, then it contains a term for red.
If a language contains four terms, then it contains a term for either green or yellow (but not both).
If a language contains five terms, then it contains terms for both green and yellow.
If a language contains six terms, then it contains a term for blue.
If a language contains seven terms, then it contains a term for brown.
If a language contains eight or more terms, then it contains a term for purple, pink, orange, grey, or some combination of these.
It is monolexemic. (for example, blue, but not bluish)
Its signification is not included in that of any other color term. (for example, crimson is a type of red)
Its application must not be restricted to a narrow class of objects. (for example, blonde is restricted to hair, wood)
It must be psychologically salient for informants. (for example, "the color of grandma's freezer" is not psychologically salient for all speakers)
In case of doubt, the following "subsidiary criteria" were implemented:
The doubtful form should have the same distributional potential as the previously established basic color terms. (for example, you can say reddish but not salmonish)
Color terms that are also the name of an object characteristically having that color are suspect, for example, gold, silver and ash.
Recent foreign loan words may be suspect.
In cases where lexemic status is difficult to assess, morphological complexity is given some weight as a secondary criterion. (for example, red-orange might be questionable)
Berlin and Kay also found that, in languages with less than the maximum eleven color categories, the colors found in these languages followed a specific evolutionary pattern. This pattern is as follows:
All languages contain terms for black and white.
If a language contains three terms, then it contains a term for red.
If a language contains four terms, then it contains a term for either green or yellow (but not both).
If a language contains five terms, then it contains terms for both green and yellow.
If a language contains six terms, then it contains a term for blue.
If a language contains seven terms, then it contains a term for brown.
If a language contains eight or more terms, then it contains a term for purple, pink, orange, grey, or some combination of these.