The Effects of Fluorescent Lighting Filters on Skin Appearance and Visual Performance

Illuminating engineers, lighting designers and others have long debated the importance of providing an artificial light source that mimics the characteristics of natural light. Several products are available that purport to provide more natural light, of which retrofit plastic filters are one. Product testimonials praising these products abound, but there is little empirical data concerning their effects on the visual environment. This paper reports two experiments concerning this issue, the first being a test of the hypothesis that selected retrofit magenta filters improve skin appearance in comparison to other common lighting sources or a placebo condition. The second experiment tested the hypothesis that selected retrofit magenta filters improve short-term visual performance, compared to other common lighting sources or a placebo condition. The results show that the selected filters improved skin appearance relative to unfiltered fluorescent lamps. There were no differences between preferences for skin appearance under comparable magenta filters from two different manufacturers. In general, light sources relatively richer in red than green were preferred. There were no effects of light source spectral composition on short-term visual performance.