I have done the six--vegetable demonstration in class for a number of years.  
Generally the result has been 70-80% carrot.  A couple of controls groups have 
resulted in 10-20% carrot. (None of these  had any resemblence to good science.)   We 
have talked about a number of alternative explainations for the results, including the 
six primes sticks, which primes carrot.  We have talked about other little experiments 
we could do, etc.  It is good exercise.  

There was a case a couple of years ago, where a student offered that six primed sex 
and sex primed . . . 

Tom 

Thomas J. Hershberger, PhD
Professor of Psychology
Chatham College
Pittsburgh, PA  15232

[EMAIL PROTECTED]
412 365-1128 


-----Original Message-----
From: jpuente [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Tuesday, September 09, 2003 11:53 AM
To: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences
Subject: RE: search term


Perhaps the six primes carrot because carrot is often thought of as carrot 
sticks and sticks can be easily associated with six (rhymes, starts with same 
letter).

I've heard of several other types of similar examples, but not the one written 
below.  They are explained to work due to (presumably) neural network 
associations; you can also explore priming.

Two examples I know are:
e.g.
1) Have someone SAY "ROAST" 5 TIMES, NOW SPELL "ROAST" ... WHAT DO YOU PUT IN 
A TOASTER? you will find that people will tend to say toast instead of bread
2) Have someone SAY "SILK" 5 TIMES, NOW SPELL "SILK" ... WHAT DO COWS DRINK? 
you will find that people will tend to say milk instead of water
etc...

Jennifer Puente



>===== Original Message From "Teaching in the Psychological Sciences" 
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> =====
>In a message dated 9/8/03 5:53:08 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
>
>> A student is attempting some research based on the observation that when Ss
>> are asked to perform a number of mathematical operations which result in
>> "six" (eg. What is 2 + 4) and then asked to name a vegetable the most 
frequent
>> response is "carrot"
>
>First time I ever heard about this.  What is hypothesized to be the mechanism
>involved?
>
>Riki Koenigsberg
>[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>
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