Russian speakers spot the difference between two blues faster than English speakers do

Russian has no single word for 'blue' — it splits the color into goluboy (light blue) and siniy (dark blue), treated as distinctly as English treats blue and green. In a 2007 study, Russian speakers were measurably faster at telling apart two blues that crossed that linguistic boundary than two blues that didn't, while English speakers tested on the same colors showed no such gap. It's one of the more rigorous pieces of evidence that language can subtly shape perception.

— Jonathan Winawer et al., Russian blues reveal effects of language on color discrimination — Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2007