In the emotional variant of this task, colour words are substituted for emotional words or pictures that are related to a particular individual’s area of concern, such as alcohol-related words for alcohol-addicted individuals. Although both the classic and the emotional Stroop tests involve the need to suppress responses to distracting stimulus information while selectively maintaining attention on the stimulus property that is needed to complete the task, only the emotional Stroop task uses emotional relevance as a distractor. Such emotional Stroop designs can potentially further demarcate the altered PFC activity in addiction: is it generalizable to any type of conflict or does it occur specifically during conflicts in a drug-related context?
