Counting Stroop Task

PI Name: Jeff Epstein PhD

Email: Jeff.Epstein@cchmc.org

Areas: anterior cingulate cortex; frontal regions

Program: E-Prime1.1

Durations: 8 minutes

Special Equipment: Visual Presentation and Reponse buttons

Description: Sets of 1-4 identical words will appear on the screen. Children are asked to report the number of words that appear on the screen. For example, if the word “two” appeared four times on the screen, the correct response would be 4. Children respond by pressing the button corresponding to their response on a 4-button response box. There are two conditions that are related to the word category. The interference condition contains all number words (i.e., “one,” “two,” “three,” or “four) in the interference condition, word meaning may be activated automatically producing a response incompatible with the required response. The neutral condition contains names of common animals (i.e., “dog,” “cat,” “mouse,” or “bird”). The two conditions are balanced for the number and length of the words. All runs begin and end with 30 seconds of fixation on a fixation cross. After the fixation period, stimuli are presented for 1.5 seconds and are proceeded by the next trial. There is no inter-trial interval. Blocks of 20 trials will contain either all neutral or all interference trials. Each block lasts 30 seconds.