Several of my students last semester in PSYC 101 asked me if I knew why the number 5 was related to the color red. They even asked me what color came to mind with I thought of the number 5 (I even said red) and then they proceeded to ask why. My answer then was similar to those on this list - Red is high in availability (particularly on our campus where red is the school color). The students claim there was published evidence of a study but none could produce it nor can I find it (I've been a little plagued by what search terms to use). Anyone else hear of this?
I now have an alternative hypothesis that most people who do not answer Red Hammer think the e-mail is silly and hit delete while those who do think Red Hammer are amazed and promptly respond and forward. My apologies if someone else has suggested this or something similar as my initial response was Blue and Screwdriver I hit delete along with some of the reply messages, but these two thoughts have been making my work difficult this morning so I thought I should send them into cyber-space to free my mind. Doug Doug Peterson, Ph.D. Acting Director of the Honors Program Associate Professor of Psychology 414 E. Clark The University of South Dakota Vermillion SD 57069 e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Honors Program: (605) 677-5223 Dept. of Psychology: (605) 677-5295 -----Original Message----- From: Annette Taylor, Ph. D. [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, February 09, 2005 10:45 AM To: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences Subject: RE: Fwd: Brain game Well I picked a red screwdriver, so there! But that aside, I had seen a similar discussion where yellow was considered to be the most common color to be picked. I just make take Paul up on his research design below and toss it to some of my students Unfortunately, I deleted the original post. Can someone send it to me backchannel? Finally, did it have a reference of any sort? Annette Quoting Paul Smith <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > Being yet another of that reported 2% (orange hammer, in my case), I'm a bit > disinclined to explain a phenomenon that so far doesn't seem to exist. > > However, I can imagine a mechanism by which the math would make a difference. > "Red" and "hammer" seem fairly prototypical of their respective categories, > right? What causes a person to mention a NON-prototypical member of a > category when asked to mention a member of a category? Is it possible that a > heavy mental load (the calculating) heads off some other process that might > otherwise "kick in" when we decide to show off our uniqueness by coming up > with some non-prototypical example? > > > Without the math, ask a group of people to name a color. Then ask them to > name a tool. Red > > and hammer are probably most likely (although not 98%, with or without the > math). > > Have a large group do it with the math. Have another large group do it > without the math. Have another large group do it with some other fairly heavy > but non-mathematical task (perhaps "count the letters 't' in this sentence"). > I imagine there'd be slightly different frequencies of "red hammer" across > the groups. I would also look at the frequencies of oddball responses: things > like "purple t-square", for example. I'd predict a lot more of those in the > no-task group, and an effect that was less subtle than the "red hammer" > effect (because that might not be the clear prototypes for everyone). > > Paul Smith > Alverno College > Milwaukee > > Michael T. Scoles, Ph.D. > Interim Chair, Dept. Psychology & Counseling > University of Central Arkansas > Conway, AR 72035 > >>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 02/08/05 4:23 PM >>> > Note: forwarded message attached. > Hi: Any Tipster know what makes this one work? > Gerry Palmer > > > > __________________________________ > Do you Yahoo!? > All your favorites on one personal page * Try My Yahoo! > http://my.yahoo.com > > --- > You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > --- > You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Annette Kujawski Taylor, Ph. D. Department of Psychology University of San Diego 5998 Alcala Park San Diego, CA 92110 [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: archive@jab.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
