Effect of Space on Auditory Temporal Processing with a Single-Stimulus Method

Abstract

The exact nature of the relation between space and time is certainly one of the most fundamental issues in physics (Buccheri, Saniga, & Stuckey, 2003), but it is also an intriguing question for experimental psychologists (Casasanto, Fotakopoulou, & Boroditsky, 2010). A function of perception is to form mental representations indicating what object exists, where it is located, and how it acts, i.e., how the object moves in space with the lapse of time. Space and time are integrated in the perceptual system to cause the perception of motion and speed, and such integration is required to determine the performance of the motor system (e.g., hand movement; see Lee, 2000). How space and time exert mutual influence is a question that was addressed many years ago (Abe, 1935; Helson, 1930), notably by J. Piaget, who studied the ontogenesis of the relations between time, distance and speed (Piaget, 1955). Time perception has been often explained with the “internal-clock hypothesis,” which is notable in discussing the perceptual relation between space and time. An internal clock is usually assumed to be a pacemaker-counter device, with the first module emitting pulses accumulated by the second one (Grondin, 2001, 2010). The amount of accumulation decides the perceived time duration. The performance level is varied, however, when some variation of nontemporal factors are introduced in experiments. This variability, in a duration discrimination task for instance, can be observed by varying the time intervals' structure (filled or empty; Grondin, 1993), or by varying the sensory modality to be stimulated. Space is a nontemporal factor, which is susceptible to vary the performance level of the internal clock. There are two illusions concerning the perceptual relation between space and time, which have been studied since the early 20th century (see Jones & Huang, 1982; Sarrazin, Giraudo, & Pittenger, 2007; ten Hoopen, Miyauchi, & Nakajima, 2008). The tau effect takes place typically in the successive presentation of three signals, say, X, Y, and Z, with Y somewhere between X and Z (Helson, 1930; Helson & King, 1931; Henry, McAuley, & Zaleha, 2009). They are delivered from different sources spaced at equal intervals, resulting in two equal intervals in space, X-Y and Y-Z. These intervals are perceived as unequal in their distance, however, if the signals are presented at unequal intervals in time; if the time interval defined by X and Y is shorter (longer) than the time interval defined by Y and Z, the spatial distance between X and Y is perceived as shorter (longer) than the spatial distance between Y and Z. In other words, the spatial-interval ratio is perceived as if it were similar to the time-interval ratio. Such interaction between space and time can be caused in the opposite direction with