Practical – STROOP TEST

OBJECTIVE: To verify the presence of stroop effect experienced by the subject

INTRODUCTION
 (Introduction of ATTENTION )

Selective attention

 Stro0op Effect

The Stroop effect is one of the best known phenomena in cognitive psychology. The Stroop
effect occurs when people do the Stroop task. The Stroop effect is related to selective
attention, which is the ability to respond to certain environmental stimuli while ignoring
others.
Even though it was developed in the 1930s, the Stroop task is still frequently used in
cognitive psychological laboratories to measure how well people can do something that
clashes with their typical response pattern. This task requires a certain level of "mental
control". That is, you need to be aware of the task you are doing now and ignore how you
would normally respond to words. This requires "control" over your own default cognitive
processing.
The Stroop effect is the degree of difficulty people have with naming the colour of the ink
rather than the word itself. In Stroop’s words, there is "interference" between the colour of
the ink and the word meaning. This interference occurs no matter how hard you try, which
means that it is uncontrollable with the best conscious effort. It implies that at least part of
our information processing occurs automatically.
One of the explanations for the difficulty is that we are so used to processing word meaning
while ignoring the physical features of words, that it is a learned response. The Stroop task
requires us to do something which we have never learned and which is opposite what we
normally do. 

How the Stroop Effect Works

The words themselves interfere with your ability to quickly say the correct colour of the word. Two
different theories have been proposed to explain this phenomenon:

 Selective attention theory: According to this theory, naming the actual colour of the words requires much
more attention than simply reading the text.
 Speed of processing theory: This theory states that people can read words much faster than they can name
colours. The speed at which we read makes it much more difficult to name the colour of the word after
we've read the word.
 Automaticity: This theory proposes that automatic reading doesn't require focused attention. Instead, the
brain simply engages in it automatically. Recognizing colours, on the other hand, may be less of
an automated process. While the brain registers written meaning automatically, it does require a certain
 amount of attentional resources to process colour, making it more difficult to process colour information
and therefore slowing down reaction times.

Stroop (1935) suggested that the difference in colour naming and word reading was due to colours being associated
with a variety of behavioural responses while words were associated with only one nehavioural response: reading.
In order to further study the relationship between colour naming and word reading, Stroop devised the etst which
has come to be called the Stroop Colour and Word Test

HYPOTHESIS: No

VARIABLES: No
 Independent Variable-

 Dependent Variable.-

DETAILS OF THE SUBJECT:

Name:

Age:

Gender:

Educational Qualification:

Religion:

MATERIALS AND APPARTUS REQUIRED:

Stroop test sheet, stopwatch, pencil, pen etc

DESCRIPTION OF APPARTUS/ TOOL

The current Stroop Test which is used in the practical is Standardised Version consisting of 3 sheets.
Each page has 5 columns of 20 items. The Word page consists of the word “RED”, “GREEN”, and “Blue”
arranged randomly and printed in black ink on a white 8.5”x 11” sheet of paper. No word is allowed to
follow itself within a column.
The Colour page consists of 100 items , all written as XXXX, printed in either red, green or blue ink. No
colour was allowed to follow itself in coloumn , not to match the corresponding item on the Word Page.
(For example, if the thirteenth item on the Word was red, the thirteenth item on the Colour page could
not be printed in red ink.
The Colour- Word page consist of the words from the Word page printed in the colours from the Colour
page. The two pages were blended item from item: Item 1 from the Word page is printed in the colour
of Item 1 from the Colour Page to produce Item 1 on the Colour-Word page. In no case does the word
and the colour it is printed in match one another.

PROCEDURE
a. Pre arrangements:
(1. All the material were kept ready…………………………………
(2. ………………………………………………………
(3. ………………)
4. The subject is given a booklet containing all three pages but views only one page at a time.

Instructions:

For 1st Page

This is a test of how fast you can read the words on this page. After I say begin, you are to read down the columns
starting with the first one and the moving dwn the column till the last item and then going to the next column and
starting with the top item. Continue without stopping until you finish down till the last column. If you are able to
finish all the column before I stay ,”Stop”, then return to the first column and begin again from the 1 st item.
Remember, do not stop reading until I tell you to Stop. You have to read out loud as quickly as you can. If you
make a mistake, I will say “No”to you. Correct your error and continue without stopping. After I say Stop, circle
the item you are on. If you finish the page and have began again , ut a ‘1’ bseside your circle.

For 2nd Page

This is a test of how fast can you name the colour on this page. You will complete this page just as you did the
previous page , starting with the first column. Remember to name the colours out load as quickly as you can

For 3rd Page

This Word page is like the page you just finished. I want you to name the colour of the ink the words are printed
in ignoring the word that is printed for each item. How will do this page just like the others starting with the first
column. Remember, if you make a mistake , just correct it and go on.

b.
c. Actual administration: After the arrangements were made and instructions were given to the subject, the
test was conducted in 3 parts. Part l with the Word Page, Part 2 with the Colour Page, and Part 3 with
Colour-Word page. Each part was administered for 45 secs.

PRECAUTIONS AND CONTROL:

It was confirmed whether the subject has understood the instructions correctly of not.
It should be taken care that the subject only views one page at a time.
Tester should keep a close attention when the subject is reading aloud and immediately ask him to repeat when
the response is incorrect.

Time limit of 45 seconds should be strictly followed

INTROSPECTIVE REPORT

SCORING:

The Stroop Test yields 3 basic scores.

The Raw Word scores (W) is the number of items completed on the Word page. The Raw Colour score
(C) is the number of items completed on the Colour Page. The Actual Raw Colour-Word( CW) scores is
the number of items completed on the Colour-Word page.
Predicted Time taken to read one Colour – Word item would be the time taken for one Word item
followed by one Colour word item
Errors are not counted as they result in a lower overall score since the subject is made to repeat the
item.
Time to read each item on all the three pages is found out using the following method:-
Total time to read each page is 45 secs. i.e., T=45
W=
C=
CW =

1. Time to read one item on the Word Page (Tw)

2. Time to read one item on the Colour page (Tc)

 3. Actual time taken to read one item on the Colour- Word page (AT)

4. Predicted Time to read one item on the Colour-Word page (PT)

5. Interference Score-

I = AT- PT

RESULT AND INTERPRETATlON

The objective of the practical was to check the Strop effect on the subject using standard Color Stroop
Test version. The test comprised of 3 parts where the subject first had to read the item printed with
black ink that are name of the colours. The 2nd page had the items printed with different colour ink with
no words printed and the last page had the items printed with colour ink having words as name of the
colours which were not same as the ink they are printed in.
The test assessed the speed of the subject to read these items. There were total 100 items on each
page and total 45 seconds were allotted for each page to read as many as items correctly.
Raw scores were calculated for each page and the time taken for each item to be read by the subject
was also found as per the scoring done above.
Time to read one word item followed by one colour item gives us the expected or predicted time to read
one combined Colour-Word item. The subjects Predicted time taken to read one Colour-Word item from
his time to read one Word item and one Colour item separately came out to be____(value of PT)_____

The actual time taken by the subject to read one Colour- Word Item on the third Page was also found
out directly based on the raw scores obtained from the CW items, i.e. _______(value of AT in
seconds)____

Interference Score gives us the difference of the predicted time to read each item, and the actual time
taken by the subject which is _____(value of I)____

This value of interference shows that the subject definitely has experienced some lag in reading the
Colour -Word item and there was Stroop Effect.
(if the value of intereference is more than 1 sec , you will write that the subject has experieced a good
amount of Stroop effect which was also evident during the experiment as the subject made lot of errors
and was getting stuck frequently.)
(if the value is below 1, you will write that, The subject experienced the Stroop effect but at a lower
extent and could give better attention to the colours and name them correctly.

CONCLUSlON
On the basis of the Stroop Test, it can be verified that the subject definitely exprienced the Stroop
Effect while performing the test.

REFERENCES

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