Abstract. Processing colored pictures of objects results in a preference to choose the former color for a specific object in
a subsequent color choice test (Wippich & Mecklenbräuker, 1998). We tested whether this implicit memory effect is
independent of performances in episodic color recollection (recognition). In the study phase of Experiment 1, the color of
line drawings was either named or its appropriateness was judged. We found only weak implicit memory effects for
categorical color information. In Experiment 2, silhouettes were colored by subjects during the study phase. Performances
in both the implicit and the explicit test were good. Selections of “old” colors in the implicit test, though, were almost
completely confined to items for which the color was also remembered explicitly. In Experiment 3, we applied the opposition
technique in order to check whether we could find any implicit effects regarding items for which no explicit color recollection
was possible. This was not the case. We therefore draw the conclusion that implicit color preference effects are not
independent of explicit recollection, and that they are probably based on the same episodic memory traces that are used in
explicit tests.
Key words: implicit memory, color memory, episodic memory trace, picture memory, color preferences