The 411 - The Mood Ring

A mood ring is a novelty ring which changes color in response to body temperature, using a thermochromic liquid crystal. The mood ring is a form of biofeedback and supposedly indicates the temperament of the wearer, indicated by the ring's color. Mood rings were a fad whose popularity peaked in the United States in the 1970s, and they are now seen as an icon of 1970s culture.

There are many different types of mood rings, and it generally depends on the manufacturer which mood the colors represent. The ring has however, also appeared as other forms of jewelery including in necklaces, earrings, and toerings. In present day, the finger rings and the earrings are the most popular.

The Mood Ring was invented in the late 1960s by Marvin Wernick, when he accompanied a doctor to an emergency nearby. The doctor pulled out a strip of thermotropic material to gauge the child's temperature by applying the strip directly to his forehead and jewelery designer Wernick knew he had the makings of a winning item.

Wernick encapsulated ovals of the material within clear glass cameos and glass domes set in brushed gold and silver ring settings. His signature "hang-tag" explained the ring's amazing properties. (Pictures are not original Mood Rings, but independent manufacturers using the concept.)

While some attribute the invention of the mood ring to Joshua Reynolds, Reynolds won't take credit for it, as he's aware that he was one of the many to jump on the Mood Ring craze, copying a winning (and unfortunately for Wernick, unpatented) item.

Joshua Reynolds reportedly invented the Thighmaster, and was the heir to the Richard Joshua Reynolds tobacco fortune. Reynolds envisioned the mood rings as "portable biofeedback aids", and managed to sell $1 million worth of them in a three month period in 1975. Even so, Reynold's company went bankrupt, victim of a flooded market of imitations.

The "stone" in a mood ring is, essentially, thermotropic crystals covered or surrounded by glass. These crystals are very sensitive, and when the temperature changes, their components change, or "twist". Light that hits upon the crystals will have different wavelengths absorbed and reflected. The heat from the wearer's finger is conducted to the inside of the ring, and "twists" the crystals inside. The crystals then reflect different wavelengths of light, thereby changing the color of the ring.

Due to fluctuations in the making of mood rings by various companies, interpretation of mood ring colors are not universal. However, a certain standard is fairly prevalent, and is the only one commonly found in any form of documentation. This standard is based on the crystals being calibrated to have the color green reflected at 82 degrees Fahrenheit (27.7 degrees Celsius), which is the typical surface temperature of people. Variations of the actual "neutral temperature", caused by differing surface temperatures among different people, as well as effects from outside temperatures, cause mood ring measurements to differ, and make their readouts rather unreliable.

Black: Tense, nervous, harassed, overworked; may also indicate a damaged ring

Grey: Anxious, nervous, strained

Amber: Nervous, emotions mixed, unsettled

Green: Average reading. Active, not under great stress

Blue-green: Emotionally charged, somewhat relaxed

Blue: Relaxed, at ease, calm

Dark blue/Purple: happy, romantic, passion

When people undergo stress, their surface body temperature drops. This is represented in the mood ring's color phasing from the neutral green to amber, to grey, to black. Conversely, a passionate mood causes one's capillaries to move closer to the surface, raising surface temperature. This is rendered in the mood ring by the color moving toward blue-green, blue, and then a darkened blue.

A mood ring plays a key part in the 1991 movie My Girl, and the actors that were in the movie now wear mood rings.

"Mood Ring" is a song by Paul Thorn from his 1999 album "Ain't Love Strange"

"Mood Rings" is a song by Relient K about emotional girls and their unpredictability.

Rhythm and blues singer Mýa named her third CD Moodring because she felt that each song represented a different color.

Skate-Gate, an episode of The Replacements, reveals that Dick Daring, Riley and Todd's father, wears a mood ring.

The episode of the TV series "Aladdin" titled "The Flawed Couple" features a villain that uses jewels known as "Mood Stones" which actually change the mood of the person wearing it.

*From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia