stroop effect introduction and theories
STROOP EFFECT
When the words ‘red, green, yellow and blue’ printed in coloured inks but in incongruent combinations of colour and word e.g. the word ‘red’ printed in colour yellow, the word yellow in the colour blue and so on and the Ss are required to name the colours as quickly as they can, ignoring the words, it is not easy to do so. Invariably, the colours are hard to name than when they are shown in simple strips uncomplicated by the words. Typically volume of voice goes up; reading falters; now and then the words break through abortively and there are embarrassed giggles. These and other signs of strain and effort are common. This phenomenon was first noticed by Janesch and was first reported in this century by John Ridley Stroop (1935).
In 1955, Stroop published his landmark article on attention and interference. The task given came to be known as the Stroop Task and is seen as tapping in to the primitive operations of cognition, offering clues to the fundamental process of attention. He found that people required an average of 110 seconds to name the ink colour of 100 words that were incongruent colour names, as against 63.3 seconds to name the ink colour of 100 solid colour squares.
REVIEW OF LITERATURE
The roots of Stroop’s research are evident 50 yrs earlier in the work of James McKeen Catell (1886). He reported that objects and colours took longer to name them than corresponding words to read. This is because, in the case of words and letters, the association between the idea and name has taken place so often that the process has become automatic, whereas in the case of colours and pictures, we must by voluntary effort choose the name.
Catell’s studies were replicated by Hollingsworth, Brown and Rigen. Hollingworth (1912, 1915, and 1923) suggested that word reading required only articulation, but that colour naming demanded articulation plus association. Brown (1915) and Ligon (1932) maintained that both tasks involved two processes
When the words ‘red, green, yellow and blue’ printed in coloured inks but in incongruent combinations of colour and word e.g. the word ‘red’ printed in colour yellow, the word yellow in the colour blue and so on and the Ss are required to name the colours as quickly as they can, ignoring the words, it is not easy to do so. Invariably, the colours are hard to name than when they are shown in simple strips uncomplicated by the words. Typically volume of voice goes up; reading falters; now and then the words break through abortively and there are embarrassed giggles. These and other signs of strain and effort are common. This phenomenon was first noticed by Janesch and was first reported in this century by John Ridley Stroop (1935).
In 1955, Stroop published his landmark article on attention and interference. The task given came to be known as the Stroop Task and is seen as tapping in to the primitive operations of cognition, offering clues to the fundamental process of attention. He found that people required an average of 110 seconds to name the ink colour of 100 words that were incongruent colour names, as against 63.3 seconds to name the ink colour of 100 solid colour squares.
REVIEW OF LITERATURE
The roots of Stroop’s research are evident 50 yrs earlier in the work of James McKeen Catell (1886). He reported that objects and colours took longer to name them than corresponding words to read. This is because, in the case of words and letters, the association between the idea and name has taken place so often that the process has become automatic, whereas in the case of colours and pictures, we must by voluntary effort choose the name.
Catell’s studies were replicated by Hollingsworth, Brown and Rigen. Hollingworth (1912, 1915, and 1923) suggested that word reading required only articulation, but that colour naming demanded articulation plus association. Brown (1915) and Ligon (1932) maintained that both tasks involved two processes