Digital Stroop Five Digit Test
DIGITAL STROOP “FIVE DIGIT TEST”
PRE-ALPHABETIC MULTILINGUAL READING FLUENCY
EDITIONS: Madrid, TEA Ediciones (2007).
Sao Paulo, CETEPP / HOGREFE (2015).
PARTS 1 AND 2: LOWER-BRAIN PERCEPTUAL-MOTOR REACTIONS
PARTS 3 AND 4: HIGHER-BRAIN EXECUTIVE PERFORMANCE
(adapted from: Chequer de Castro & al, 2015).
FDT is an easy 5 min neuropsychological test modified from the well-known Stroop Color-Word Test; adapted as a totally "prealphabetical and multilingual” task, much less discriminative against less educated subjects; and susceptible of being administered in any kind of national, regional or indigenous language and in all the languages spoken in any multilingual geographic region. (Even in thyose languages that are partially or totally unfamiliar the examiner);
FDT measures dysfunction (that is, loss of speed increase of errors) at four naming tasks of increasing complexity; exploring automatic and controlled reading fuency. Parts 1-2 (reading and counting) explore immediate attention, readiness and descriptive fluency; parts 3-4 (choosing and shifting) explore sustained attention, flexibility, persistence, controlled fluency and absence of overload or fatigue.
Contact:
Latencies in response preparation (speed) and loss of goal-orientation (errors) abruptly separate healthy from dysfunctional subjects, sending them towards entirely different areas of the scale, with very little overlap between their distributions. Obviously, FDT allows the very early diagnosis of educational, medical or degenerative problems (dyslexia, brain damage, MCI, dementia), by allowing the valid testing of even less-educated and non-English reading subjects. Past research on the FDT included work on low-incidence languages (such as Basque), d indigenous languages (Mapuche, Mayan, Nahuatl, Zapotecan); illiterate demented adults (Argentina); and young pre-readers (Brasil, Colombia),
Sedo, M. A., Malloy-Diniz, L. & Moreira-Lucena, A. (2013) Speed of cross-modal interconnections:
automatic and conflictive reading. International Neuropsychological Society Liaison Committee .
Newsletter, 30, 3-5.
Sedo, M. A. (2004) The “Five Digit Test”: a color-free, non-reading alternative to the Stroop. INS-NET
Bulletin (Winter).
SOURCES: Serial fluency: Denckla & Rudel, 1976; Stroop, 1935; Wiig, 1969.
Perceptual interference: Stroop, 1935.
Switching: Bohnen & al, 1992a and 1992b.
Pre-alphabetic, multilingual paradigm: Sedo, 1994 (Edith Kaplan Award) .
SELECTED READINGS:
DeCristoforo, L. A. (2000) Normative and validation study of the Five-Digit Test in older adults
(unpublished doctoral dissertation). San Francisco, CA: Wright Institute.
DeErausquin, G. (2016) Prediction of neurocognitive deficits by Parkinsonian motor impairment in
schizophrenia: A study in Neuroleptic-naïve subjects, unaffected first-degree relatives and healthy
controls from an indigenous population.” Schizophrenia Bulletin,,March.
DeErausquin, G. (2015) An endophenotype of schizophrenia relates neurocognitive deficits to
parkinsonian motor impairment in an untreated indigenous npopulation. American Journal of
Psychiatry
de Paula, J. J. , Goncalvez-Querino, E. H., & al. (2015) Transcultural issues on the assessment of
executive functions and processing speed in older adults with low formal education: Usefulness of
The Five Digit Test in the assessment of dementia. Geriatrics and Gerontology, International, (3) 388- 389.
de Paula, J.J., De Souza, D., Nunes, E., & al (2012) Automatic and controlled attentional processes in
amnesic Mild Cognitive Impairment: The use of a mini-verbal test. http://www.SciRP.org/journal/- psych).
de Paula, J. , Teixeira, R., Costa & al (2011) Assessing processing speed and executive functions in low
educated older adults: Usee of the Five Digit Test in patients with Alzheimer’s Disease, Mild
Cognitive Impairment and Major Depressive Disorder. Clinical Neuropsychiatry 8, 6, 339-346.
González-Alemán. G. (2006) Descripción y cuantificación del endofenotipo cognitivo en una
población indígena con esquizofrenia virgen de tratamiento, y demostración de la
esquizotaxia en los hermanos sanos. (Unpublishedn doctoral dissertation.) Buenos Aires, Medical
School.
Haase, V. G., Julio-Costa, A., Lopez-Silva, J. B., , Starling-Alves, I., Antunez, A. , Pinheiro-Chagas, P. &
Wood, G. (20140 Contributions from specific and general factors to unique deficits: two cases of
mathematics learning difficulties. Frontiers in Psychology: www.frontiersin.org.
Ibarra, M. (2009). Marcadores Psicológicos en el Espectro Autista desde una Aproximación Neuro-
psicológica. Proyecto de Tesis Doctoral. Universidad Andrés Bello, Caracas, Venezuela.
Lang, J. A. (2001) Validation of the Five Digit Test in a clinical sample: an alternative to the Stroop
Color-Word task with possible cultural implications. San Francisco, CA: Allianty University. Un-
published doctoral dissertation.)
Navarro, S. I. (2008) Literates’ and illiterates’ Performance at a Digital Form of the Stroop Test.
Presented to the Massachusetts Neuropsychological Society, M.I.T. Faculty Club, Boston.
Sedo, M. A. (2013) Speed of cross-modal interconnections in automatic and conflictive reading. INS-
NET Bulletin (Spring).
Sedo, M. A. (2007) Five Digit Test (Test de los Cinco Digitos). Manual. Madrid, Tea Ediciones.
Sedo., M. A. (2004). Test de las Cinco Cifras: una alternativa multilingue y no lectora al test de Stroop.
Revista Espanola de Neurologia, 38, 9, 824-828.
Sedo, M. A. (2001): “Diagnosing learning disabilities in bilingual urban students: A neuro-psychological
approach” in: Ponton, M.O. & Leon-Carrion, J., eds, Neuropsychology and the Hispanic Patient:
a Clinical Handbook. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Sedó, M. A. (2004a) Test de las cinco cifras: una alternativa multilingüe y no lectora al Test de Stroop.
Revista Española de Neurología, 38, 9, 824-828.
Sedo, M. A. (2004) The “Five Digit Test”: a color-free, non-reading alternative to the Stroop. INS-NET
Bulletin (Winter).
Sedo, M. A. & DeCristoforo, L. (2001) All-Language verbal tests free from linguistic barriers. Revista
Espanola de Neuropsicologia, 3, 68-82. Wolf, M. (2007) Proust and the Squid. The story and
science of the reading brain. New York, N.Y.: Harper Perennial.
Sedo, M. A., Malloy-Diniz, L. & Moreira-Lucena, A. (2013 ) Speed of cross-modal interconnections:
automatic and conflictive reading. International Neuropsychological Society Liaison Committee .
Newsletter, 30, 3-5.
Tomasetti, D. & Tracanelli, D. (2003) Analisis psicometrico del Test de Cinco Digitos en ninos con
edades comprendidas entre 7 y 11 anos. Caracas, Venezuela: Universidad Andres Bello.
Walker, W. L. (2003) S tudy of the Five Digit Test across cultures. San Francisco, Wright Institute
(Unpublished doctoral dissertation) Available from UMI Dissertation Services.
T E S T I M O N I A L S
… and now, thanks to you, we can test linguistic minorities. Edith B. Kaplan
(Lexington, MA).
Keep on keeping on! Antonio Puente, Wilmington, NC
... … …
…You have done a great favor to the psychological community by creating
the FDT, and it will live on long after we are both gone. John F. R.
McLachlan (Toronto, Canada.)
... … …
…Your [testing materials] are based on sound neuropsychological principles
and may go from the simply creative to the truly ingenious. Irving Hurwitz
(Boston, MA.)
... … …
It´s an excellent piece of work, and I hope it will obtain the diffusion it It´s an
excellent piece of work, and I hope it will obtain the diffusion it deserves.
Alfredo Ardila, Miami.
... … …
For Araucan to Zapotecan we will probably always need to rely more heavily
on (other) methods of inference (…) Your tests certainly are an invaluable
contribution (…) Recently the 5 Digit Test was critical in allowing me to
diagnose a post-concussional disorder in a Burundian refugee. Tedd Judd
(Bellingham, WA.)
... … …
Totalement astucieux et simplement brilliant. Eduardo Cisneros (Montréal,
Quebec.)
... … …
These tests “take my breath away”. Leandro Malloy-Diniz, Belo Horizonte,
Brazil.
... … …
Your tests [….] seem right on target to me. I am sure this can be helpful to
lots of teachers and kids. Melvin D. Levin, Chapel Hill, NC
... … …
I find your instruments very interesting, useful, and revolutionary. (…) Looks
incredible to me. I believe that your work can move neuropsychology into a
more modern world. Enrique López, Los Angeles, CA.
... … …