Dataset Information

Distortions of subjective time perception within and across senses.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The ability to estimate the passage of time is of fundamental importance for perceptual and cognitive processes. One experience of time is the perception of duration, which is not isomorphic to physical duration and can be distorted by a number of factors. Yet, the critical features generating these perceptual shifts in subjective duration are not understood.

Methodology/findings

We used prospective duration judgments within and across sensory modalities to examine the effect of stimulus predictability and feature change on the perception of duration. First, we found robust distortions of perceived duration in auditory, visual and auditory-visual presentations despite the predictability of the feature changes in the stimuli. For example, a looming disc embedded in a series of steady discs led to time dilation, whereas a steady disc embedded in a series of looming discs led to time compression. Second, we addressed whether visual (auditory) inputs could alter the perception of duration of auditory (visual) inputs. When participants were presented with incongruent audio-visual stimuli, the perceived duration of auditory events could be shortened or lengthened by the presence of conflicting visual information; however, the perceived duration of visual events was seldom distorted by the presence of auditory information and was never perceived shorter than their actual durations.

Conclusions/significance

These results support the existence of multisensory interactions in the perception of duration and, importantly, suggest that vision can modify auditory temporal perception in a pure timing task. Insofar as distortions in subjective duration can neither be accounted for by the unpredictability of an auditory, visual or auditory-visual event, we propose that it is the intrinsic features of the stimulus that critically affect subjective time distortions.

SUBMITTER: van Wassenhove V

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2174530 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Distortions of subjective time perception within and across senses.

van Wassenhove Virginie V Buonomano Dean V DV Shimojo Shinsuke S Shams Ladan L

PloS one 20080116 1

<h4>Background</h4>The ability to estimate the passage of time is of fundamental importance for perceptual and cognitive processes. One experience of time is the perception of duration, which is not isomorphic to physical duration and can be distorted by a number of factors. Yet, the critical features generating these perceptual shifts in subjective duration are not understood.<h4>Methodology/findings</h4>We used prospective duration judgments within and across sensory modalities to examine the ...[more]

PMID: 18197248

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Project description:The association between idiopathic Parkinson's disease, a paradigmatic dopamine-deficiency syndrome, and problems in the estimation of time has been studied experimentally for decades. I review that literature, which raises a question about whether and if dopamine deficiency relates not only to the motor slowness that is an objective and cardinal parkinsonian sign, but also to a compromised neural substrate for time perception. Why does a clinically (motorically) significant deficiency in dopamine play a role in the subjective perception of time's passage? After a discussion of a classical conception of basal ganglionic control of movement under the influence of dopamine, I describe recent work in healthy mice using optogenetics; the methodology visualizes dopaminergic neuronal firing in very short time intervals, then allows for correlation with motor behaviors in trained tasks. Moment-to-moment neuronal activity is both highly dynamic and variable, as assessed by photometry of genetically defined dopaminergic neurons. I use those animal data as context to review a large experimental experience in humans, spanning decades, that has examined subjective time perception mainly in Parkinson's disease, but also in other movement disorders. Although the human data are mixed in their findings, I argue that loss of dynamic variability in dopaminergic neuronal activity over very short intervals may be a fundamental sensory aspect in the pathophysiology of parkinsonism. An important implication is that therapeutic response in Parkinson's disease needs to be understood in terms of short-term alterations in dynamic neuronal firing, as has already been examined in novel ways-for example, in the study of real-time changes in neuronal network oscillations across very short time intervals. A finer analysis of a treatment's network effects might aid in any effort to augment clinical response to either medications or functional neurosurgical interventions in Parkinson's disease.

Dataset Information

Distortions of subjective time perception within and across senses.

Background

Methodology/findings

Conclusions/significance

Publications

Distortions of subjective time perception within and across senses.

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