Are hue and saturation carried in different neural channels?

Discrimination of hue angle and discrimination of colorimetric purity assessed with a common metric

It has been suggested that thresholds for discriminating colorimetric purity are systematically higher than those for discriminating hue angle, a difference captured in Judd's phrase "the super-importance of hue." However, to compare the two types of discrimination, the measured thresholds must be expressed in the same units. An attractive test is offered by measurements along the horizontal lines in the chromaticity diagram of MacLeod and Boynton [ J. Opt. Soc. Am.69, 1183 (1979)JOSAAH0030-394110.1364/JOSA.69.001183], i.e., a chromaticity diagram. A horizontal line that extends radially from the white point represents a variation in colorimetric purity alone (and subjectively a variation that is primarily in saturation). In contrast, a horizontal line that runs along the $x$x axis of the diagram, close to the long-wave spectrum locus, corresponds predominantly to variation in hue angle. Yet, in both cases, only the ratio of the excitations of the long- and middle-wave cones is being modulated, and so the thresholds can be expressed in a common metric. Measuring forced-choice thresholds for 180 ms foveal targets presented on a steady field metameric to Illuminant D65, we do not find general support for Judd's working rule that thresholds for purity are systematically twice those for saturation. Thresholds for colorimetric purity were only a little higher than those for hue angle, and the advantage for hue was seen in only part of the ranges that were tested. However, in the upper-left quadrant of the MacLeod-Boynton diagram, where the excitation of short-wave cones is high and where both hue angle and colorimetric purity vary along any given horizontal line, thresholds were indeed sometimes half those observed for discrimination of purity alone.