Attention Interference, Automatic Processing, and the Stroop Effect
The experiment tests whether conflict takes place between the automatic process of reading a word and the controlled process of naming the ink colour of the word by replicating a version of the Stroop effect.
A sample of 20 volunteering participants, 10 men and 10 women, aged 18-69, took part in the experiment. Participants were given two conditions, one list with colour-related distractor words and one list with colour-neutral words. For each participant, time necessary to name the ink colour of the list of words was recorded per condition.
The results showed that participants named the ink colours of neutral words faster than of colour-related distractor words ( Overall alpha level was .011). Therefore, we can say that participants’ inability to ignore irrelevant stimuli is dependent of the semantic meaning of the stimuli.
According to William James (as cited in Edgar, 2007) attention is a model of selecting and processing multiple streams of incoming information. Selective attention is an information processing procedure that allows focusing on specific stimuli while preventing other distracting information to interfere. This procedure is necessary as we are not capable of processing all incoming stimuli simultaneously and also need to detect relevant information as quickly as possible. Selective attention is therefore a performance limiting procedure as put forward by Kahneman’s model of ‘limited-capacity’ central processor (as cited in Edgar, 2007). According to his theory, this processor evaluates how demanding it is to process the stimuli and then adjusts attention accordingly. Moreover, processing capacities can be influenced by factors like arousal. These findings were also supported by Posner and Boies’s ‘dual-task studies of attention’ (as cited in Edgar, 2007) which corroborated the idea that there are limited amounts of attention available for specific cognitive processes.
Broadbent’s ‘bottleneck theory of attention’ (as cited in Edgar, 2007) seems
A sample of 20 volunteering participants, 10 men and 10 women, aged 18-69, took part in the experiment. Participants were given two conditions, one list with colour-related distractor words and one list with colour-neutral words. For each participant, time necessary to name the ink colour of the list of words was recorded per condition.
The results showed that participants named the ink colours of neutral words faster than of colour-related distractor words ( Overall alpha level was .011). Therefore, we can say that participants’ inability to ignore irrelevant stimuli is dependent of the semantic meaning of the stimuli.
According to William James (as cited in Edgar, 2007) attention is a model of selecting and processing multiple streams of incoming information. Selective attention is an information processing procedure that allows focusing on specific stimuli while preventing other distracting information to interfere. This procedure is necessary as we are not capable of processing all incoming stimuli simultaneously and also need to detect relevant information as quickly as possible. Selective attention is therefore a performance limiting procedure as put forward by Kahneman’s model of ‘limited-capacity’ central processor (as cited in Edgar, 2007). According to his theory, this processor evaluates how demanding it is to process the stimuli and then adjusts attention accordingly. Moreover, processing capacities can be influenced by factors like arousal. These findings were also supported by Posner and Boies’s ‘dual-task studies of attention’ (as cited in Edgar, 2007) which corroborated the idea that there are limited amounts of attention available for specific cognitive processes.
Broadbent’s ‘bottleneck theory of attention’ (as cited in Edgar, 2007) seems