A computerized stroop test for the evaluation of psychotropic drugs in healthy participants.
BACKGROUND
The Stroop paradigm evaluates susceptibility to interference and is sensitive to dysfunction in frontal lobes and drug effects. The aim of the present study was to establish a simple and reliable computerized version of Stroop color-word test, which can be used for screening of various psychotropic drugs.


METHODS
The standardized method was followed in all cases, by recording the reaction time (RT) in msec in 24 healthy participants using computerized version of Stroop color-word test. Reproducibility of the test procedure was evaluated by recording the RTs by a single experimenter on two sessions (interday reproducibility). Validity of the model was further tested by evaluating the psychotropic effect of Zolpidem 5 mg, Caffeine 500 mg, or Placebo on 24 healthy subjects in a randomized, double blind three-way crossover design.


RESULTS
The method was found to produce low variability with coefficient of variation less than 10%. Interday reproducibility was very good as shown by Bland-Altman plot with most of the values within ±2SD. There was a significant increase in RTs in Stroop performance with Zolpidem at 1 hr and 2 hrs; in contrast, caffeine significantly decreased RTs in Stroop performance at 1 hr only compared to placebo.


CONCLUSIONS
The Stroop color-word recording and analysis system is simple, sensitive to centrally acting drug effects, and has potential for future experimental psychomotor assessment studies.
Department of Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics, ICMR Advanced Centre for Clinical Pharmacodynamics, Nizam's Institute of Medical Sciences, Panjagutta, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India.
Raveendranadh
R
Pilli
Mur
M
Naidu
Usha Rani
UR
Pingali
J C
JC
Shobha
A Praveen
AP
Reddy
Attention; cognition; neuropsychology; stroop interference