Chapter 8 Activity PDF

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Chapter 8 Activity...

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Psych 105 Activity #1: Stroop Effects Overview: Students will practice their data collection skills while observing how reading (and language) skill can interfere with something as simple as colour identification. We will explore how cognition involves ‘shortcuts’, and how some of the fast and frugal aspects of thinking can lead to interesting errors. Goals: This activity is meant to demonstrate the automaticity of reading, as well as the top-down influence of reading skill on perception of other aspects of written words. It also gives students practice recording data and building a graph. Materials Needed: Stroop task words (https://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/java/ready.html) Activity sheet Excel file to enter data and create graph Student Role: The famous "Stroop Effect" is named after J. Ridley Stroop who discovered this strange phenomenon in the 1930’s. First head to the website listed above (https://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/java/ready.html). Click on the link “Go to the first test” Then, name the colors of the words that appear in the online task. Do NOT read the words, rather, say the color of the ink the words are printed in. For example, if the word "BLUE" is printed in a red color, you should say "RED". Say the colors as fast as you can. It is not as easy as you might think. Once the first test is completed, click finish and a time will appear. Record this time on a piece of paper or in your excel spreadsheet in a column titled color/word match. Click on “Continue Experiment” Then, again name the colors of the words that appear in the online task. Just as before, do not read the words, say the color of the words. Once the test is completed, click finish and another time will appear. Record this time on a piece of paper or in your excel spreadsheet in a column titled color/word NO match. Click “Back to Stroop Effect” and repeat the experiment. (Click [Run Experiment]) Complete the online task 3 more times and record the data in the same way. Once you have completed all 4 iterations of the task, you will use your data to complete a bar graph.

Activity Questions: 1. Insert the graph you created for your data. What is the pattern you see in your results?

2. How would you use the concept of top-down processing to explain your results? Due to there being a lack of context around the color/word no match expirment, my times were longer as it was more difficult to interpret isolated words than when the color and words matched. Had the color/word no match contained sentences, my times would have been lower as there is more context surrounding the words to aid me.

3. State a hypothesis (a specific prediction) about who should be MOST affected by the Stroop interference task, and who should be LEAST affected. Why should these people be most and least affected by the Stroop interference effect? Individuals of older age would be most affected by the Stroop interference task as their brain processing speed and senses would have been slower than that of someone younger, who would be less affected by the interefence task. Children would be least affected as they are faster at processing information as well as having keen senses....