On the Relation between Time Perception and the Timing of Motor Action: Evidence for a Temporal Oscillator Controlling the Timing of Movement

Abstract

Studies of time estimation have provided evidence that human time perception is determined by an internal clock containing a temporal oscillator and have also provided estimates of the frequency of this oscillator (Treisman, Faulkner, Naish, & Brogan, 1990; Treisman & Brogan, 1992). These estimates were based on the observation that when the intervals to be estimated are accompanied by auditory clicks that recur at certain critical rates, perturbations in time estimation occur. To test the hypothesis that the mechanisms that underlie the perception of time and those that control the timing of motor performance are similar, analogous experiments were performed on motor timing, with the object of seeing whether evidence for a clock would be obtained and if so whether its properties resemble those of the time perception clock. The prediction was made that perturbations in motor timing would be seen at the same or similar critical auditory click rates. The experiments examined choice reaction time and typing. The results support the hypothesis that a temporal oscillator paces motor performance and that this oscillator is similar to the oscillator underlying time perception. They also provide an estimate of the characteristic frequency of the oscillator.

Dissociations between motor timing, motor coordination, and time perception after the administration of alcohol or caffeine

“…Gruber and Block (2003) also reported that their effects of caffeine on timing cannot be explained easily by recourse to a single timer, since caffeine only affected performance when estimates were requested prospectively, not when requested retrospectively. Relatedly, in the present series of experiments, the selectivity of caffeine's effects for reaction time performance rather than for time production or discrimination seems inconsistent with the idea that time estimation and reaction time are based on a single (or, at least, common) oscillator (e.g., Treisman et al 1992). If that were the case, the two kinds of task would be expected to exhibit similar changes under the influence of caffeine.…”

“…If that were the case, the two kinds of task would be expected to exhibit similar changes under the influence of caffeine. Treisman et al (1992) based their claim of a common oscillator on two experiments with a small number of different subjects in which performance was impaired by a concurrent auditory click sequence. They claimed that this impairment only occurred when the click rate was at certain frequencies and that the frequencies matched in the two experiments.…”

Cognitive motion extrapolation and cognitive clocking in prediction motion tasks.

“…For example, a mental rotation task (Cooper & Shepard, 1973) should interfere with visuospatial processes (e.g., CME) that potentially occur in the PM task and thereby affect concurrent TIC judgments (Liddell, 1998). This is a reasonable proposal especially because previous results suggest that both time perception and motor action use the same or similar timing mechanisms (Treisman et al, 1992) and that visuospatial processing in working memory can interfere with concurrent time estimation (Fortin & Breton, 1995).…”

“…Indeed, previous results suggest that both time perception and motor action use the same or similar timing mechanisms (Treisman, Faulkner, & Naish, 1992). Nevertheless, an assumption that the same clocking process is used in PM tasks and time perception does not solve the problem of designing an interference task because there are several models of time estimation (for a review, see Block, 1990).…”

Encoding of event timing in the phase of neural oscillations

“…; A200V: t(15) = 0.05, n.s. ; V200A: t(15) = 1.7, n.s.. et al, 1990, 1992): specifically, external temporal regularities can impose modulations of the pacemaker frequency so as to entrain the internal clock (Treisman et al, 1992). Similarly, intrinsic neural oscillations match the temporal scales of perceptual phenomena (Buzsáki and Draguhn, 2004;Roopun et al, 2008;van Wassenhove, 2009;Wang, 2010) and can be entrained to external rhythms (Rees et al, 1986;Regan, 1966).…”