Does Posture Influence the Stroop Effect?

Rosenbaum, Mama, and Algom (2017) reported that participants who completed the Stroop task (i.e., name the hue of a color word when the hue and word meaning are congruent or incongruent) showed a smaller Stroop effect (i.e., the difference in response times between congruent and incongruent trials) when they performed the task standing than when sitting. We report five attempted replications (analyzed sample sizes: N = 108, N = 108, N = 98, N = 78, and N = 51, respectively) of Rosenbaum et al.’s findings, which were conducted in two institutions. All experiments yielded the standard Stroop effect, but we failed to detect any consistent effect of posture (sitting vs. standing) on the magnitude of the Stroop effect. Taken together, the results suggest that posture does not influence the magnitude of the Stroop effect to the extent that was previously suggested.

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Classic Stroop Color Words Produce No Stroop Effect When the Display Characteristics Are Based Upon Emotional Stroop Studies With Subliminal Presentations

Psychological Reports ◽

10.1177/0033294119843220 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 123 (4) ◽

pp. 1207-1225

Author(s):

Gary D. Fisk ◽

Steven J. Haase

Keyword(s):

Stroop Task ◽

Stroop Effect ◽

Color Word ◽

Perceptual Processing ◽

Emotional Stroop ◽

Prime Stimulus ◽

Emotional Stroop Task ◽

Subliminal Stimulus ◽

Negative Findings ◽

Research Findings

Two forms of the Stroop task have produced contradictory findings regarding unconscious perceptual processing. Emotional Stroop task studies with prime words presented at an objective threshold (i.e., subliminal) produce Stroop-like effects, but comparable studies conducted with classic Stroop stimuli do not produce Stroop effects. We tested the possibility that differences in the display appearance might explain this discrepancy. Color word prime stimuli from the traditional Stroop task were used with display characteristics based upon the emotional Stroop studies. There was a Stroop effect for the relatively long prime stimulus durations (59, 87, or 108 milliseconds) but not for the brief durations (18, 24, or 38 milliseconds). Accordingly, the discrepancy in research findings cannot be attributed to simple differences in display methodology. The failure to find strong evidence of unconscious perceptual processing is consistent with the negative findings from some emotional Stroop studies that use subliminal stimulus presentations.

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To Group or n o t t o g r o u p

Experimental Psychology (formerly Zeitschrift für Experimentelle Psychologie) ◽

10.1027/1618-3169/a000033 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 57 (4) ◽

pp. 275-291 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Michael Reynolds ◽

Donna Kwan ◽

Daniel Smilek

Keyword(s):

Perceptual Organization ◽

Stroop Task ◽

Real World ◽

Stroop Effect ◽

Color Word ◽

Gestalt Principles ◽

Common Fate ◽

The Real ◽

Color Grouping ◽

The Impact

Eight experiments are reported that examine the contextual factors that influence the magnitude of color-word interference in the Stroop task. In Part 1 of the paper (Experiments 1–4) we varied letter-letter grouping using Gestalt principles of proximity and similarity. In Part 2 of the paper (Experiments 5–8) we varied word-color grouping using the Gestalt principles of similarity and common fate. The magnitude of the Stroop effect was strongly influenced by changes in both letter-letter grouping in the color-word and word-color grouping. Overall, the results suggest two ways in which perceptual organization influences the magnitude of Stroop color-word interference and more generally, that there are systematic principles that govern the impact of visually presented words across a variety of laboratory contexts and the real world.

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The Musical Stroop Effect

Experimental Psychology (formerly Zeitschrift für Experimentelle Psychologie) ◽

10.1027/1618-3169/a000197 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 60 (4) ◽

pp. 269-278 ◽

Cited By ~ 15

Author(s):

Laurent Grégoire ◽

Pierre Perruchet ◽

Bénédicte Poulin-Charronnat

Keyword(s):

Stroop Task ◽

Stroop Effect ◽

Word Reading ◽

Color Word ◽

Literacy Skills ◽

Verbal Task ◽

Musical Notation

The usual color-word Stroop task, as well as most other Stroop-like paradigms, has provided invaluable information on the automaticity of word reading. However, investigating automaticity through reading alone has inherent limitations. This study explored whether a Stroop-like effect could be obtained by replacing word reading with note naming in musicians. Note naming shares with word reading the crucial advantage of being intensively practiced over years by musicians, hence allowing to investigate levels of automatism that are out of reach of laboratory settings. But the situation provides much greater flexibility in manipulating practice. For instance, even though training in musical notation is often conducted in parallel with the acquisition of literacy skills during childhood, many exceptions make that it can be easily decoupled from age. Supporting the possibility of exploiting note naming as a new tool for investigating automatisms, musicians asked to process note names written inside note pictures in incongruent positions on a staff were significantly slowed down in both a go/no-go task (Experiment 1) and a verbal task (Experiment 2) with regard to a condition in which note names were printed inside note pictures in congruent positions.

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Effects of Response Type and Set Size on Stroop Color-Word Performance

Perceptual and Motor Skills ◽

10.2466/pms.1983.56.3.735 ◽

1983 ◽

Vol 56 (3) ◽

pp. 735-743 ◽

Cited By ~ 21

Author(s):

Lucinda McClain

Keyword(s):

Undergraduate Students ◽

Stroop Task ◽

Stroop Effect ◽

Color Word ◽

Verbal Response ◽

Response Type ◽

Response Condition ◽

Discrete Trials ◽

Verbal Responses ◽

Set Size

The effect of several procedural variables was investigated in a discrete-trials Stroop task. Undergraduate students identified the color of four types of stimuli (asterisks, words unrelated to color, and incongruent and congruent Stroop stimuli) using verbal responses, buttons labeled with color words, and buttons labeled with colors. Set size was manipulated by presenting 2, 3, 4, or 5 different colors in a given trial block. A significant Stroop effect occurred in the verbal response condition, the size of the Stroop effect was reduced in the word-button condition, and the Stroop effect was eliminated in the color-button condition. Increases in set size produced linear increases in response time but did not influence the size of the Stroop effect.

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EXPRESS: The Contribution of Meaning to the Detection of Task Conflict

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology ◽

10.1177/17470218211001331 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 174702182110013

Author(s):

Ronen Hershman ◽

Yulia Levin ◽

Joseph Tzelgov ◽

Avishai Henik

Keyword(s):

Reaction Time ◽

Stroop Task ◽

Color Word ◽

Word Meaning ◽

Conflict Detection ◽

Pupil Dilation ◽

Task Conflict ◽

Information Conflict ◽

And Task

The color-word Stroop task produces both information conflict (detection of the ink color vs. word meaning) and task conflict (respond to the ink color vs. read the word). In the present study we measured both reaction time and pupil dilation, and the neutral stimuli in our study were non-readable letter strings as well as meaningless non-readable stimuli (i.e., colored patches and abstract character strings). Our results showed slowest responses in the incongruent trials and fastest responses in the congruent trials. However, no differences were found between the investigated neutrals. In contrast, pupil dilation was largest in the incongruent trials and smallest in the neutral trials. Moreover, the more the neutral stimuli were meaningless, the less the pupil dilation that was observed. Our results suggest that non-word meaningless stimuli reduced task conflict (compared to all the investigated conditions). Neutral equivalence should be taken into consideration in Stroop and Stroop-like tasks.

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Semantic Conflict Processing in the Color-Word Stroop and the Emotional Stroop

Journal of Psychophysiology ◽

10.1027/0269-8803/a000100 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 27 (4) ◽

pp. 149-164 ◽

Cited By ~ 10

Author(s):

Montserrat Zurrón ◽

Marta Ramos-Goicoa ◽

Fernando Díaz

Keyword(s):

Stroop Task ◽

Color Word ◽

Event Related Potentials ◽

Semantic Content ◽

Emotional Stroop ◽

Semantic Equivalence ◽

Incongruent Color ◽

Semantic Conflict ◽

Related Potentials ◽

Temporal Locus

With the aim of establishing the temporal locus of the semantic conflict in color-word Stroop and emotional Stroop phenomena, we analyzed the Event-Related Potentials (ERPs) elicited by nonwords, incongruent and congruent color words, colored words with positive and negative emotional valence, and colored words with neutral valence. The incongruent, positive, negative, and neutral stimuli produced interference in the behavioral response to the color of the stimuli. The P150/N170 amplitude was sensitive to the semantic equivalence of both dimensions of the congruent color words. The P3b amplitude was smaller in response to incongruent color words and to positive, negative, and neutral colored words than in response to the congruent color words and colored nonwords. There were no differences in the ERPs induced in response to colored words with positive, negative, and neutral valence. Therefore, the P3b amplitude was sensitive to interference from the semantic content of the incongruent, positive, negative, and neutral words in the color-response task, independently of the emotional content of the colored words. In addition, the P3b amplitude was smaller in response to colored words with positive, negative, and neutral valence than in response to the incongruent color words. Overall, these data indicate that the temporal locus of the semantic conflict generated by the incongruent color words (in the color-word Stroop task) and by colored words with positive, negative, and neutral valence (in the emotional Stroop task) appears to occur in the range 300–450 ms post-stimulus.

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A Unique Asymmetrical Stroop Effect in Absolute Pitch Possessors

Experimental Psychology (formerly Zeitschrift für Experimentelle Psychologie) ◽

10.1027/1618-3169/a000153 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 59 (5) ◽

pp. 272-278 ◽

Cited By ~ 19

Author(s):

Lilach Akiva-Kabiri ◽

Avishai Henik

Keyword(s):

Selective Attention ◽

Stroop Task ◽

Stroop Effect ◽

Congruency Effect ◽

Absolute Pitch ◽

Naming Task ◽

Color Naming ◽

Reading Task ◽

Pitch Processing ◽

Reverse Pattern

The Stroop task has been employed to study automaticity or failures of selective attention for many years. The effect is known to be asymmetrical, with words affecting color naming but not vice versa. In the current work two auditory-visual Stroop-like tasks were devised in order to study the automaticity of pitch processing in both absolute pitch (AP) possessors and musically trained controls without AP (nAP). In the tone naming task, participants were asked to name the auditory tone while ignoring a visual note name. In the note naming task, participants were asked to read a note name while ignoring the auditory tone. The nAP group showed a significant congruency effect only in the tone naming task, whereas AP possessors showed the reverse pattern, with a significant congruency effect only in the note reading task. Thus, AP possessors were unable to ignore the auditory tone when asked to read the note, but were unaffected by the verbal note name when asked to label the auditory tone. The results suggest that pitch identification in participants endowed with AP ability is automatic and impossible to suppress.

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Is the Musical Stroop Effect Able to Keep Its Promises?

Experimental Psychology (formerly Zeitschrift für Experimentelle Psychologie) ◽

10.1027/1618-3169/a000222 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 61 (1) ◽

pp. 80-83 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Laurent Grégoire ◽

Pierre Perruchet ◽

Bénédicte Poulin-Charronnat

Keyword(s):

Stroop Task ◽

Stroop Effect ◽

Extensive Training ◽

Natural Settings ◽

Current Procedure

Grégoire, Perruchet, and Poulin-Charronnat (2013) claimed that the Musical Stroop task, which reveals the automaticity of note naming in musician experts, provides a new tool for studying the development of automatisms through extensive training in natural settings. Many of the criticisms presented in the four commentaries published in this issue appear to be based on a misunderstanding of our procedure, or questionable postulates. We maintain that the Musical Stroop Effect offers promising possibilities for further research on automaticity, with the main proviso that the current procedure makes it difficult to tease apart facilitation and interference.

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