The researchers showed subjects drawings in which a lineup of six otherwise identical images differed only in some aspect of color. The T-shirt of a boy taking a test, for example, was switched from black to blue to green to red to white to yellow. The same for a businessman’s necktie, a schoolgirl’s dress, a dog’s collar, a boxer’s gloves.

Participants were asked to link images with traits. Which boy was likeliest to cheat on the test? Which man was likely to be in charge at work? Which girl was the smartest in her class, which dog the scariest?

Again and again, among both children and young adults, black pulled ahead of nearly every color but red. Black was the color of cheating, and black was the color of cleverness. A black tie was the mark of a boss, a black collar the sign of a pit bull. Black was the color of strength and of winning. Black was the color of rage.

“We have strong opinions about black and red,” Dr. Kramer said, “and that doesn’t seem to be true for any other color.”

The contrariness of black has long been expressed in our clothing. As the color best able to hide stains and dirt, black was the color of the laboring classes, and of the pious: people who sought to signal their disinterest in personal vanity and worldly affairs.

“Black was the color of modesty,” said Steven Bleicher, author of “Contemporary Color: Theory and Use,” and a professor of visual arts at Coastal Carolina University. “You still see that today across cultures, in Hasidic Judaism, where people wear all black, or the Amish.”

Black took on an air of cultured urbanity beginning in the Renaissance, when so-called sumptuary laws limited the wearing of rich colors like red and purple to the aristocracy. Newly prosperous merchants, lawyers, scholars and other professionals responded by donning luxurious black outfits of velvet, silk and fine wool, which also proved ideal for the display of gold accessories and brocade. Before long, aristocrats were wild for black clothing, too.