Temporal difference thresholds and repetitive stimulation: Can click trains improve temporal sensitivity?

Trains of auditory clicks increase subsequent judgements of stimulus duration by approximately 10%. Scalar timing theory suggests this is due to a 10% increase in pacemaker rate, a main component of the internal clock. The effect has been demonstrated in many timing tasks, including verbal estimation, temporal generalisation, and temporal bisection. However, the effect of click trains has yet to be examined on temporal sensitivity, commonly measured by temporal difference thresholds. We sought to investigate this both experimentally; where we found no significant increase in temporal sensitivity, and computationally; by modelling the temporal difference threshold task according to scalar timing theory. Our experimental null result presented three possibilities which we investigated by simulating a 10% increase in pacemaker rate in a newly-created scalar timing theory model of thresholds. We found that a 10% increase in pacemaker rate led to a significant improvement in temporal sensitivity in only 8.66% of 10,000 simulations. When a 74% increase in pacemaker rate was modelled to simulate the filled-duration illusion, temporal sensitivity was significantly improved in 55.36% of simulations. Therefore, scalar timing theory does predict improved temporal sensitivity for a faster pacemaker, but the effect of click trains (a supposed 10% increase) appears to be too small to be reliably found in the temporal difference threshold task.

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A supplementary experiment for Matthews (2011, Can we use verbal estimation to dissect the internal clock? Differentiating the effects of pacemaker rate, switch latencies, and judgment processes. Behavioural Processes, 86, 68--74.)

10.31234/osf.io/ts4xv ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

William John Skylark

Keyword(s):

Time Perception ◽

Internal Clock ◽

Verbal Estimation

Matthews (2011) examined the use of verbal estimation in studies of time perception. During the process of archiving the data for the three experiments reported in that paper, I realised that I had conducted an earlier version of Experiment 1; the method was very similar to the published version, but a larger set of to-be-judged durations was used. The pattern of results is the same as in the published version (although slightly noisier, with fewer trials per cell of the design). I report this earlier study here for the sake of completeness; I do not currently intend to submit this report to a journal.

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Speeding up an Internal Clock in Children? Effects of Visual Flicker on Subjective Duration

The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology Section B ◽

10.1080/02724990143000252 ◽

2002 ◽

Vol 55 (3b) ◽

pp. 193-211 ◽

Cited By ~ 120

Author(s):

Sylvie Droit-Volet ◽

John Wearden

Keyword(s):

Discrimination Training ◽

Internal Clock ◽

Difference Limen ◽

Subjective Duration ◽

Bisection Task ◽

White Circle ◽

Temporal Bisection ◽

Bisection Point ◽

Temporal Bisection Task ◽

Weber Ratio

Children of 3, 5, and 8 years of age were trained on a temporal bisection task where visual stimuli in the form of blue circles of 200 and 800 ms or 400 and 1600 ms duration, preceded by a 5-s white circle, served as the short and long standards. Following discrimination training between the standards, stimuli in the ranges 200-800 ms or 400-1600 ms were presented with the white circle either constant or flickering. Relative to the constant white circle, the flicker (1) increased the proportion of “long” responses (responses appropriate to the long standard), (2) shifted the psychophysical functions to the left, (3) decreased bisection point values, at all ages, and (4) did not systematically affect measures of temporal sensitivity, such as difference limen and Weber ratio. The results were consistent with the idea that the repetitive flicker had increased the speed of the pacemaker of an internal clock in children as young as 3 years. The “pacemaker speed” interpretation of the results was further strengthened by a greater effect of flicker in the 400/1600-ms condition than in the 200/800-ms condition.

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Can we use verbal estimation to dissect the internal clock? Differentiating the effects of pacemaker rate, switch latencies, and judgment processes

Behavioural Processes ◽

10.1016/j.beproc.2010.09.006 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 86 (1) ◽

pp. 68-74 ◽

Cited By ~ 18

Author(s):

William J. Matthews

Keyword(s):

Internal Clock ◽

Verbal Estimation

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Total etch dentin bonding systems: scanning electron microscopy of the resin-dentin hybrid layer

Proceedings, annual meeting, Electron Microscopy Society of America ◽

10.1017/s0424820100130092 ◽

1992 ◽

Vol 50 (2) ◽

pp. 1092-1093

Author(s):

Jorge Perdigao

Keyword(s):

Composite Resin ◽

Mechanical Interlocking ◽

Hybrid Layer ◽

Agent Based ◽

Dentin Bonding ◽

Acid Agent ◽

Bond Strengths ◽

Main Component ◽

Bonding Systems ◽

New Generation

In 1955, Buonocore introduced the etching of enamel with phosphoric acid. Bonding to enamel was created by mechanical interlocking of resin tags with enamel prisms. Enamel is an inert tissue whose main component is hydroxyapatite (98% by weight). Conversely, dentin is a wet living tissue crossed by tubules containing cellular extensions of the dental pulp. Dentin consists of 18% of organic material, primarily collagen. Several generations of dentin bonding systems (DBS) have been studied in the last 20 years. The dentin bond strengths associated with these DBS have been constantly lower than the enamel bond strengths. Recently, a new generation of DBS has been described. They are applied in three steps: an acid agent on enamel and dentin (total etch technique), two mixed primers and a bonding agent based on a methacrylate resin. They are supposed to bond composite resin to wet dentin through dentin organic component, forming a peculiar blended structure that is part tooth and part resin: the hybrid layer.

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Sex Differences in Time Production Revisited

Journal of Individual Differences ◽

10.1027/1614-0001/a000059 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 33 (1) ◽

pp. 35-42 ◽

Cited By ~ 22

Author(s):

Joseph Glicksohn ◽

Yamit Hadad

Keyword(s):

Sex Differences ◽

Individual Differences ◽

Sex Difference ◽

Absolute Error ◽

Internal Clock ◽

Target Duration ◽

Log P ◽

Men And Women ◽

Time Production ◽

T Score

Individual differences in time production should indicate differences in the rate of functioning of an internal clock, assuming the existence of such a clock. And sex differences in time production should reflect a difference in the rate of functioning of that clock between men and women. One way of approaching the data is to compute individual regressions of produced duration (P) on target duration (T), after log transformation, and to derive estimates for the intercept and the slope. One could investigate a sex difference by comparing these estimates for men and women; one could also contrast them by looking at mean log(P). Using such indices, we found a sex difference in time production, female participants having a relatively faster internal clock, making shorter time productions, and having a smaller exponent. The question is whether a sex difference in time production would be found using other methods for analyzing the data: (1) the P/T ratio; (2) an absolute discrepancy (|P-T|) score; and (3) an absolute error (|P-T|/T) score. For the P/T ratio, female participants have a lower mean ratio in comparison to the male participants. In contrast, the |P-T| and |P-T|/T indices seem to be seriously compromised by wide individual differences.

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