The test developed by Stroop some seventy years ago is used, among other purposes, as an indicator of attention disorder and general mood fluctuations. The present research attempted to determine whether a correlation existed between the Stroop Test, student ability as defined by a standardised IQ test, and general classroom behaviour. This study involved 87 year three students, across four schools in Perth, Western Australia. Independent variables included socio-economic level, gender, and

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... ol type (government or private). Results indicated a strong positive correlation of IQ and Stroop Test Ranking with Socio-economic status. No significant differences were found between IQ and Stroop by type of school, nor were any significant differences found with regard to gender. Results suggest that the Stroop Test may be a powerful predictive instrument with regard to students' academic performance and general behaviour rankings. THE STROOP TEST: A REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE The "Stroop Test" or "Stroop Effect" is named after psychologist John Ridley Stroop who first identified the phenomenon in his PhD work in the 1930s. 1 Since that time, over 700 articles have made reference to this formative work of Stroop. 2 Among other uses, the test is seen as being a valuable identifier of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) 3 . With the recent advances in brain-based research, an attempt has been made to better understand the Effect through exploration of its immediate neurological environment. The challenge of the task is to focus on one particular feature (language), while blocking out another (colour). Colour words are presented in the congruent mode (e.g. the word 'red' written in a red colour) or the incongruent mode (e.g. the word 'red' written in a different colour). In the incongruent mode, the instruction is given to read column-wise, and name the colour in which the word is written (Table 1) .