1. The Effect of Shape and Color on Recall Kristen Brookes, Meredith Elliott, & Sarah Pasquale

2. Past Research  Familiarity with a road sign leads to faster reaction times  Processing the meaning of the signs is an automatic response which leads to an automatic behavior  Road Block Paradigm  Drivers at road blocks not being able to recall there was a sign but performed the action the sign recommended (sharp left turn)  (Crundall & Underwood, 2001)

3. Past Research  For each shape we develop a template -priori (Hatzidimos, 2004)

4. Research Question  Does practice and familiarity have an effect on shape and color recognition?  Example: Road Signs

5. Hypothesis  It is hypothesized that participants will have a faster reaction time to shapes and colors that are more prominent in everyday life

6. Method  Participants  9  5 females  4 males  No known color deficiencies in participants  Undergraduate students at small liberal arts college  Equipment  Gateway Computer  Shape Response Experiment created in JAVA (Krantz, 2008)

7. Method  Stimulus  Series of shapes  Octagon, Circle, Rectangle, Triangle Down, and Triangle Right  Red, Green, Yellow, and White  Duration of Stimuli: 100ms  Procedure  125 trials  Responded using mouse

8. Results  Repeated Measures ANOVA  Reaction Times, Percentage shape and color were chosen 1 st, and each color  Differences in means of reaction times to color was not significant F(3)=.141, (p=.934) and reaction times to shape was not significant F(4)=1.353, (p=.272)  Difference in means of percentage shape was chosen first was significant F(4)=4.019, (p=.009)  Difference in means of percentage color was chosen first was not significant F(3)=.857, (p=.477)  There was no interaction

9. Results

10. Discussion  There should be no difference in color due to conditions in external environment  Indication of faulty signs if color results significant  We cannot rely on color for sign recognition because the color can vary substantially:  Fading  Weather conditions  Time of day  Shadowing (Hatzidimos, 2004)  Shape remains constant making them more reliable  Insignificant differences in shape and color reveal that we respond equally fast to all signs possibly due to practice effects

11. Conclusion  Cross – cultural effects  Using other shapes and color  Standard for comparison – indication of practice effects  Words inside shapes  Automaticity  Recognition without processing

12. Questions?