Foveal and parafoveal processing of asynchronous Stroop stimuli

Abstract

Two experiments are presented which used a form of the Stroop colour-word task to study the processing of target and distractor information under changing conditions of temporal and spatial proximity. Experiment 1 focused on the marked empirical discrepancies in previous research reported in the recent literature. A coloured target and a distractor (neutral, facilitative or interfering) that were separated by variable onset asynchronies were presented foveally to observers. The findings of this study indicate strong distractor effects on response latency at the intermediate stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs) (around 0 ms) and a clear monotonic decrease in reaction time for colour naming at extreme positive and negative SOAs. Experiment 2 used this same task but presented targets parafoveally and distractors foveally. This manipulation resulted in the same general pattern of processing as found in Expt 1. In addition, a laterality effect was found when the target and distractor were incongruent; the left visual field/right hemisphere showed significantly greater interference as indicated by longer reaction times. These results are discussed in terms of current models of information processing of compound stimuli.

Goal-referenced selection of verbal action: Modeling attentional control in the Stroop task.

“…Unlike the real data of M. O. Glaser and Glaser, facilitation in the simulation slightly "peaks" around the SOA of 0 ms. However, in a replication of this study, Long and Lyman (1987) and W. R. Glaser and Glaser (1989) did observe most facilitation around SOA ϭ 0 ms. As discussed, the amount of facilitation at short SOAs varies between studies (MacLeod, 1991). Figure 13 also shows the results for reading.…”

“…For the congruent condition, a rather flat pattern of facilitation was observed from a 31-ms effect at the distractor-first SOA of Ϫ400 ms to a 30-ms effect at the distractorfirst SOA of Ϫ100 ms. Figure 1 shows how the Stroop interference and facilitation varied with SOA for color naming. These SOA patterns of interference and facilitation have been replicated with the Stroop task, for example, by Neumann (1980), Goolkasian (1981), and Long and Lyman (1987), and by W. R. Glaser and Düngelhoff (1984) using the picture-word variant. For reading aloud, M. O.…”

“…Thus, more errors are predicted for the SOA of 0 than for Ϫ100 ms, in agreement with the empirical findings (cf. Long & Lyman, 1987, Experiment 2).…”

The visual-auditory color-word Stroop asymmetry and its time course

“…Glaser & Glaser, 1982; W. R. Glaser & Glaser, 1989;Long & Lyman, 1987;Roelofs, 2003). The time course of the visual-auditory color-word Stroop effect challenges the relative pathway strength account (which predicts that most interference should occur at the longest distractor-first SOAs) and supports the word production architecture account (which predicts that most interference should occur around SOA ϭ 0 msec).…”

Strategic Allocation of Attention Reduces Temporally Predictable Stimulus Conflict

“…R. Glaser & Dungelhoff, 1984; W. R. Glaser & Glaser, 1989; Long & Lyman, 1987; Lu & Proctor, 2001; Rayner & Springer, 1986; Roelofs, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2010; Starreveld & La Heij, 1996; Sugg & McDonald, 1994),(see also Flowers, 1990; and Mattler, 2003 for related Flanker-SOA tasks).…”