POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE PROCESSING

Psychologists have found that when people read a sentence with a negative word in it (such as the word NOT), they show slower and less accurate comprehension than they do if no negative words appear in the sentence. We will be showing you two-word positive and negative phrases and asking you to respond to them. We expect your results will show that you can respond more quickly and more accurately to the positive sentences than to the negative ones.

The experiment begins with the following screen

When you slide the mouse pointer over the small square between the words TRUE and FALSE, a two-word phrase will appear in the box directly above the words TRUE and FALSE and the box just above that will fill with a color.

The two word phrase always begins with either the word IS or the word NOT. The word IS or NOT is followed by the name of a color. Your task is to decided, as quickly as possible, if the two-word phrase is TRUE or FALSE as concerns the displayed color. In the example, above, you would answer TRUE because the color that is displayed is pink. If the phase had been NOT PINK and you saw the color pink displayed, you would answer FALSE.

You answer TRUE or FALSE by sliding the mouse pointer over the word TRUE or the word FALSE (don't click). As soon as you do this, your response time is recorded, and you are ready for the next trial. You begin the next trial by again sliding the mouse pointer over the small square between the words TRUE and FALSE.

There are 40 trials. At the end of 40 trials, a window will pop up and display your results.

When you have read and understood these instructions, Please click on the word START below, to begin.

START