title: Additive factors do not imply discrete processing stages: a worked example using models of the stroop task.
abstract: Previously, it has been shown experimentally that the psychophysical law known as Piéron's Law holds for color intensity and that the size of the effect is additive with that of Stroop condition (Stafford et al., 2011). According to the additive factors method (Donders, 1868-1869/1969; Sternberg, 1998), additivity is assumed to indicate independent and discrete processing stages. We present computational modeling work, using an existing Parallel Distributed Processing model of the Stroop task (Cohen et al., 1990) and a standard model of decision making (Ratcliff, 1978). This demonstrates that additive factors can be successfully accounted for by existing single stage models of the Stroop effect. Consequently, it is not valid to infer either discrete stages or separate loci of effects from additive factors. Further, our modeling work suggests that information binding may be a more important architectural property for producing additive factors than discrete stages.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Sheffield Sheffield, UK.
authors.forename: Tom
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Stafford
authors.forename: Kevin N
authors.initials: KN
authors.lastname: Gurney
references.citation: Psychon Bull Rev. 2004 Jun;11(3):391-418
references.pmid: 15376788
references.citation: Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2007 Mar 29;362(1479):339-53
references.pmid: 17255023
references.citation: Psychol Rev. 2000 Apr;107(2):358-67
references.pmid: 10789200
references.citation: Trends Cogn Sci. 2001 Jan 1;5(1):10-16
references.pmid: 11164731
references.citation: Psychon Bull Rev. 1997 Jun;4(2):221-5
references.pmid: 21331828
references.citation: Acta Psychol (Amst). 1990 Aug;74(2-3):297-318
references.pmid: 2251932
references.citation: Curr Biol. 2001 Aug 7;11(15):R603-6
references.pmid: 11516966
references.citation: Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2007 Sep 29;362(1485):1671-84
references.pmid: 17428773
references.citation: Psychol Rev. 1990 Jul;97(3):332-61
references.pmid: 2200075
references.citation: Neuron. 2002 Oct 10;36(2):299-308
references.pmid: 12383783
references.citation: Brain Res Brain Res Rev. 2005 Jun;48(3):509-26
references.pmid: 15914255
references.citation: Cogn Sci. 2011 Nov-Dec;35(8):1553-66
references.pmid: 21929666
references.citation: Neural Comput. 2008 Apr;20(4):873-922
references.pmid: 18085991
references.citation: J Exp Psychol Gen. 1985 Jun;114(2):159-97
references.pmid: 3159828
references.citation: Brain Cogn. 2004 Nov;56(2):253-66
references.pmid: 15518939
references.citation: Psychol Sci. 2008 Feb;19(2):128-36
references.pmid: 18271860
references.citation: Psychol Bull. 1991 Mar;109(2):163-203
references.pmid: 2034749
references.citation: Percept Psychophys. 1996 Apr;58(3):390-400
references.pmid: 8935900
references.citation: Trends Cogn Sci. 2002 Oct 1;6(10):421-425
references.pmid: 12413575
references.citation: J Neurophysiol. 2003 Sep;90(3):1392-407
references.pmid: 12761282
references.citation: Trends Cogn Sci. 2000 Oct 1;4(10):383-391
references.pmid: 11025281
references.citation: Nat Neurosci. 2001 Apr;4(4):336-7
references.pmid: 11276213
references.citation: Curr Opin Neurobiol. 2002 Apr;12(2):141-8
references.pmid: 12015229
references.citation: Psychol Rev. 2006 Oct;113(4):700-65
references.pmid: 17014301
references.citation: Psychol Rev. 2001 Jul;108(3):550-92
references.pmid: 11488378
references.citation: Psychon Bull Rev. 2004 Dec;11(6):975-87
references.pmid: 15875968