Automatic processes are characterized as being rapid as requiring litt
le attentional effort, and as obligatory (once initiated, the activity
cannot be inhibited or controlled). In contrast, controlled processes
are slower, require attention, and are nonobligatory. This distinctio
n appears in the Stroop effect: the interference that appears when a p
erson tries to name the color of the ink in which a word is printed wh
en the word spells the name of a different color. This effect has hist
orically been attributed to an automatic reading of the color name int
erfering with the slower, less automatic, naming of the ink color (Mac
Leod, 1991; Stroop, 1935). In this report, we describe a patient with
focal brain atrophy whose speed of reading was no faster than his spee
d of naming colors, but who still showed the classic Stroop effect. Th
is finding critically challenges the traditional identification of aut
omaticity with processing speed.