Social facilitation in the Stroop task and the role of strategic inhibition

The presence of a 'naive' confederate can reduce the Stroop interference shown by participants (Huguet, Galvaing, Monteil & Dumas, 1999). We present evidence that social facilitation in the Stroop task is caused by strategic inhibition of the distracter word. Huguet et al.'s (1999) social facilitation finding was replicated, and delta plot analyses revealed that participants in the mere presence condition were strongly inhibiting distracter information. This assertion is supported by the fact that no distracter inhibition, and indeed no social facilitation, was found when the RSI was decreased so that participants were less able to prepare for every trial.