The influence of color on size and depth perception has been explored for a century, but there is very limited research on interventions that can reduce the color illusions. This study was motivated to identify interventions and propose design guidelines for information visualization, especially where size judgment is critical.

This study replicated the color size illusion and color depth illusion on an LCD monitor and it was found that yellow is the smallest and farthest color among red, yellow, green, and blue on a white background. Three types of interventions (background brightness, border color, and background grid brightness) were tested to identify the conditions that reduce the color illusions, but all of them were not statistically significant.

Based on the experiment results and literature survey, design guidelines were proposed. To extend the guidelines to the bioinformatics field, design recommendations were proposed and implementation examples were illustrated. Evaluations on design implementations were evaluated by interviewing domain experts.

Additionally, the relationship between the color size illusion and the color depth illusion was explored.