A wireless communication receiver is configured to suppress interference with respect to a received signal of interest on a selective basis responsive to evaluating whether the receiver currently is or is not operating in a colored noise/interference environment. For example, an exemplary Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) mobile station activates or deactivates interference suppression responsive to determining and evaluating an orthogonality factor, which, in this context, serves as a measure of how much downlink power gets converted into same-cell interference via multipath propagation. The orthogonality factor thus serves as an indicator of noise plus interference coloration. In one or more exemplary embodiments, then, an exemplary receiver circuit is configured to determine the orthogonality factor, evaluate it, and selectively enable or disable received signal whitening based on that evaluation. The exemplary receiver circuit and associated selective whitening method can be applied to various receiver architectures and signal types.