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Abstract

Bilateral electrolytic lesioning of the striatum led to a delay in the acquisition of a conditioned reflex to time, along with an anxiogenic effect and disturbances to the normal relationship between the level of anxiety and chronometric ability. These changes progressed with increases in the size of the destruction zone in the striatum. Combined surgery consisting of lesions to the striatum and hippocampus, like hippocampectomy alone, completely eliminated the ability to count time regardless of the size of brain lesions. The anxiogenic effect was greater in animaLs with combined procedures. Thus, the striatum and hippocampus are involved to different extents in the mechanism of internal time counting. The two structures function synergistically.

Sex Differences in Counting and Timing

“…Future studies should explore the representation of time and number by a network of neural substrates (including the basal ganglia, frontal cortex, and parietal cortex) in males and females using ensemble recordings at multiple sites (Vodolazhskaya and Beier, 2002; Varga et al, 2010; Coull et al, 2011). We hypothesize that the same neural substrates are involved in processing both temporal and numerical information, but that sexual dimorphisms in the neural substrates in temporal processing underlie differences in temporal integration and synchronization of the timing pattern as well as learning and memory for time in males and females (see Cheng et al, 2008).…”