An event-related functional MRI study comparing interference effects in the Simon and Stroop tasks.

The Stroop and Simon tasks typify a class of interference effects in which the introduction of task-irrelevant stimulus characteristics robustly slows reaction times. Behavioral studies have not succeeded in determining whether the neural basis for the resolution of these interference effects during successful task performance is similar or different across tasks. Event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies were obtained in 10 healthy young adults during performance of the Stroop and Simon tasks. Activation during the Stroop task replicated findings from two earlier fMRI studies. These activations were remarkably similar to those observed during the Simon task, and included anterior cingulate, supplementary motor, visual association, inferior temporal, inferior parietal, inferior frontal, and dorsolateral prefrontal cortices, as well as the caudate nuclei. The time courses of activation were also similar across tasks. Resolution of interference effects in the Simon and Stroop tasks engage similar brain regions, and with a similar time course. Therefore, despite the widely differing stimulus characteristics employed by these tasks, the neural systems that subserve successful task performance are likely to be similar as well.

[1]  J. R. Simon,et al.  Reactions toward the source of stimulation. , 1969, Journal of experimental psychology.

[2]  Karl J. Friston,et al.  Investigations of the functional anatomy of attention using the stroop test , 1993, Neuropsychologia.

[3]  Alan C. Evans,et al.  Attention modulates somatosensory cerebral blood flow response to vibrotactile stimulation as measured by positron emission tomography , 1991, Annals of neurology.

[4]  G Gratton,et al.  Attention and probability effects in the human occipital cortex: an optical imaging study , 1997, Neuroreport.

[5]  Pierre Celsis,et al.  The Functional Anatomy of Attention in Humans: Cerebral Blood Flow Changes Induced by Reading, Naming, and the Stroop Effect , 1994, Journal of cerebral blood flow and metabolism : official journal of the International Society of Cerebral Blood Flow and Metabolism.

[6]  J. Mazziotta,et al.  Bimodal (auditory and visual) left frontoparietal circuitry for sensorimotor integration and sensorimotor learning. , 1998, Brain : a journal of neurology.

[7]  Jonathan D. Cohen,et al.  Interference and Facilitation Effects during Selective Attention: An H2 15O PET Study of Stroop Task Performance , 1995, NeuroImage.

[8]  M. Gazzaniga,et al.  Combined spatial and temporal imaging of brain activity during visual selective attention in humans , 1994, Nature.

[9]  M. Raichle,et al.  Blood flow changes in human somatosensory cortex during anticipated stimulation , 1995, Nature.

[10]  Jonathan D. Cohen,et al.  Improved Assessment of Significant Activation in Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI): Use of a Cluster‐Size Threshold , 1995, Magnetic resonance in medicine.

[11]  J. Stroop.  Studies of interference in serial verbal reactions. , 1992 .

[12]  J. Mazziotta,et al.  Brain-behavior relationships: evidence from practice effects in spatial stimulus-response compatibility. , 1996, Journal of neurophysiology.

[13]  M. W. van der Molen,et al.  An OR analysis of the tendency to react toward the stimulus source. , 1986, Acta psychologica.

[14]  James L. McClelland,et al.  On the control of automatic processes: a parallel distributed processing account of the Stroop effect. , 1990, Psychological review.

[15]  Karl J. Friston,et al.  Movement‐Related effects in fMRI time‐series , 1996, Magnetic resonance in medicine.

[16]  M. Raichle,et al.  The anterior cingulate cortex mediates processing selection in the Stroop attentional conflict paradigm. , 1990, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[17]  Sylvan Kornblum,et al.  Changes in medial cortical blood flow with a stimulus-response compatibility task , 1994, Neuropsychologia.

[18]  Leslie G. Ungerleider,et al.  Discrete Cortical Regions Associated with Knowledge of Color and Knowledge of Action , 1995, Science.

[19]  Matthew Flatt,et al.  PsyScope: An interactive graphic system for designing and controlling experiments in the psychology laboratory using Macintosh computers , 1993 .

[20]  J. Requin,et al.  The Effects of Irrelevant Stimuli: 1. The Time Course of Stimulus-Stimulus and Stimulus-Response Consistency Effects With Stroop-Like Stimuli, Simon-Like Tasks, and Their Factorial Combinations , 1999 .

[21]  J. R. Simon,et al.  Auditory S-R compatibility: the effect of an irrelevant cue on information processing. , 1967, The Journal of applied psychology.

[22]  R. Passingham.  Attention to action. , 1996, Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences.

[23]  B. J. Casey,et al.  Regional brain activity when selecting a response despite interference: An H2 15O PET study of the stroop and an emotional stroop , 1994, Human brain mapping.

[24]  F. Valle-Inclán.  The Simon effect and its reversal studied with event-related potentials. , 1996, International journal of psychophysiology : official journal of the International Organization of Psychophysiology.

[25]  R. Desimone,et al.  Selective attention gates visual processing in the extrastriate cortex. , 1985, Science.

[26]  M. Peters,et al.  A shift of attention may be necessary, but it is not sufficient, for the generation of the Simon effect , 2000, Psychological research.

[27]  Colin M. Macleod.  Half a century of research on the Stroop effect: an integrative review. , 1991, Psychological bulletin.

[28]  D. Norman,et al.  Attention to Action: Willed and Automatic Control of Behavior Technical Report No. 8006. , 1980 .

[29]  M. Torrens.  Co-Planar Stereotaxic Atlas of the Human Brain—3-Dimensional Proportional System: An Approach to Cerebral Imaging, J. Talairach, P. Tournoux. Georg Thieme Verlag, New York (1988), 122 pp., 130 figs. DM 268 , 1990 .

[30]  D. Holender,et al.  Analytic approaches to human cognition , 1992 .

[31]  A. Anderson,et al.  An fMRI study of stroop word-color interference: evidence for cingulate subregions subserving multiple distributed attentional systems , 1999, Biological Psychiatry.

[32]  M Corbetta,et al.  Attentional modulation of neural processing of shape, color, and velocity in humans. , 1990, Science.

[33]  J R Simon,et al.  Effect of conflicting cues on information processing: the 'Stroop effect' vs. the 'Simon effect'. , 1990, Acta psychologica.

[34]  Karl J. Friston,et al.  The colour centre in the cerebral cortex of man , 1989, Nature.

[35]  J. Tracy,et al.  A comparison of 'Early' and 'Late' stage brain activation during brief practice of a simple motor task. , 2001, Brain research. Cognitive brain research.

[36]  S. Kornblum,et al.  A Parallel Distributed Processing Model of Stimulus–Stimulus and Stimulus–Response Compatibility , 1999, Cognitive Psychology.

[37]  S. Petersen,et al.  Activation of extrastriate and frontal cortical areas by visual words and word-like stimuli. , 1990, Science.

[38]  Lina L. E. Massone.  Sensorimotor learning , 1998 .

[39]  T Hasbroucq,et al.  Stimulus-response compatibility and the Simon effect: toward a conceptual clarification. , 1991, Journal of experimental psychology. Human perception and performance.

[40]  M. Corbetta,et al.  Top-down modulation of early sensory cortex. , 1997 .

[41]  M. Corbetta,et al.  Selective and divided attention during visual discriminations of shape, color, and speed: functional anatomy by positron emission tomography , 1991, The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience.

[42]  P E Roland,et al.  Processing and Analysis of Form, Colour and Binocular Disparity in the Human Brain: Functional Anatomy by Positron Emission Tomography , 1994, The European journal of neuroscience.

[43]  J R Simon,et al.  Processing symbolic information from a visual display: interference from an irrelevant directional cue. , 1970, Journal of experimental psychology.

[44]  S. Rauch,et al.  The counting stroop: An interference task specialized for functional neuroimaging—validation study with functional MRI , 1998, Human brain mapping.

[45]  Carlo Umiltà,et al.  An integrated model of the Simon effect. , 1992 .

[46]  H. Spitzer,et al.  Increased attention enhances both behavioral and neuronal performance. , 1988, Science.

[47]  P. Skudlarski,et al.  An event-related functional MRI study of the stroop color word interference task. , 2000, Cerebral cortex.

[48]  A. Schnitzler,et al.  Magnetic stimulation of the dorsal premotor cortex modulates the Simon effect. , 1999, Neuroreport.