In his doctoral thesis published in 1935, J.R. Stroop reported that the completion of a task could be strongly influenced by stimuli from another task to which it is associated. In his work, Stroop found that a subject’s ability to read words was influenced by the color in which the words were printed. Likewise, the subject’s ability to name the colors in which the words were printed was influenced by the actual words. Each task, naming colors and reading words, received inter­ference from stimuli associated with the other task 

In this experiment, subjects will perform tasks that demonstrate the Stroop Effect in several different ways: the effect of word stimuli on color naming, the effect of color stimuli on reading words, the effect of word stimuli on naming directions, and stimuli of your own choice or design. The completion time of each task will be used as an indicator of the strength of the interference of the stimuli on the task.  Since these tasks are also stressors, the heart rate and skin conductance level of each subject will be recorded before, during, and after each task.

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As a person’s psychological state changes and events in his or her environment occur, the electrical properties of the person’s skin change. These changes can be detected using the GSR-200, which applies a constant, imperceptible voltage between two electrodes attached to the skin. Since the voltage is constant, the current flowing between the electrodes is proportional to the skin conductance. The GSR-200 is able to detect the current flowing between the electrodes and convert it to a voltage that can be recorded. Using the conversion factor of the GSR-200, the recorded voltage is easily converted into units known as microSiemens (µS).

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If you plan to use any of the experiments or manuals announced in recent editions of the iWorx Newsletter, you should obtain a copy of the settings group used to configure LabScribe for these experiments.  Click here to download copies of the settings groups for the experiments or manuals announced since May 2004.  Once you have a copy of the settings group, just drop the group into the LabScribe folder on your hard drive, and use the Settings menu to load the group and a list of its experiments.

Download the installer, settings files, and manuals for Interference of Stimuli - Stroop Effect and other experiments recently published in the iWorx newsletter.

In this month’s experiment, the Stroop Effect is measured.  Learn about the interference of stimuli on associated tasks, tests used to measure interference, and how the tasks can be stressors by examining our external Web resources.

On this page we have also accumulated a host of links to informative, external physiology Web sites and conveniently categorized them into major sub categories for easy reference.   

Each lab includes a topical overview, background, equipment set-up and lab procedure, quiz questions, and an interactive LabPlayer that displays recorded data from real experiments and allows students to manipulate and record data just as they would in a "wet" lab.  Data can be captured and logged in an online Lab Journal that can be later copied to a new document or sent via email.  Labs are further enhanced with animations, diagrams, and video clips. 

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