Driven by Information: A Tectonic Theory of Stroop Effects

The goal of avoiding distraction (e.g., ignoring words when naming their print colors in a Stroop task) is opposed intrinsically by the penchant to process conspicuous and correlated characteristics of the environment (e.g., noticing trial-to-trial associations between the colors and the words). To...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Psychological review 2003-07, Vol.110 (3), p.422-471
Main Authors: Melara, Robert D, Algom, Daniel
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Activity levels. Psychomotricity
Attention
Biological and medical sciences
Cognition
Cognition & reasoning
Distraction
Environment
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Goals
Human
Humans
Information
Information processing
Interference (Learning)
Language
Mathematical Modeling
Memory
Mental Processes
Models, Psychological
Object Recognition
Psychology
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Selective Attention
Stroop Effect
Theories
Vigilance. Attention. Sleep
Visual Perception
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Summary:The goal of avoiding distraction (e.g., ignoring words when naming their print colors in a Stroop task) is opposed intrinsically by the penchant to process conspicuous and correlated characteristics of the environment (e.g., noticing trial-to-trial associations between the colors and the words). To reconcile these opposing forces, the authors propose a tectonic theory of selective attention in which 2 memory-based structures-dimensional imbalance and dimensional uncertainty-drive selection by processing salient, surprising, and/or correlated information contained within and across stimulus dimensions. Each structure modulates the buildup of excitation to targets and the buildup of inhibition to distractors and to memories of previous stimuli. Tectonic theory is implemented to simulate the impact of 4 types of context on the presence, magnitude, and direction of congruity effects and task effects in the Stroop paradigm. The tectonic model is shown to surpass other formal models in explaining the range and diversity of Stroop effects.
ISSN:0033-295X
1939-1471
DOI:10.1037/0033-295X.110.3.422