On the (a)symmetry between the perception of time and space in large‐scale environments

Abstract

Cross-dimensional interference between spatial and temporal processing is well documented in humans, but the direction of these interactions remains unclear. The theory of metaphoric structuring states that space is the dominant concept influencing time perception, whereas time has little effect upon the perception of space. In contrast, theories proposing a common neuronal mechanism representing magnitudes argue for a symmetric interaction between space and time perception. Here, we investigated space-time interactions in realistic, large-scale virtual environments. Our results demonstrate a symmetric relationship between the perception of temporal intervals in the supra-second range and room size (experiment 1), but an asymmetric relationship between the perception of travel time and traveled distance (experiment 2). While the perception of time was influenced by the size of virtual rooms and by the distance traveled within these rooms, time itself affected only the perception of room size, but had no influence on the perception of traveled distance. These results are discussed in the context of recent evidence from rodent studies suggesting that subsets of hippocampal place and entorhinal grid cells can simultaneously code for space and time, providing a potential neuronal basis for the interactions between these domains.

Age-related changes in time perception: The impact of naturalistic environments and retrospective judgements on timing performance

“…Although there have been some timing studies implementing more naturalistic paradigms and stimuli ( Boltz, 2005 ; Brunec et al, 2017 ; Riemer et al, 2018 ; Roseboom et al, 2019 ; Schlichting et al, 2018 ; Tobin et al, 2010 ; van Rijn, 2014 ), the number of studies directly comparing the effects of naturalistic versus more abstract paradigm versions is rather scarce ( Maaß et al, 2021 ; Thanopoulos et al, 2018 ). For example, investigating the phenomenon of intentional binding ( Haggard et al, 2002 ), Thanopoulos et al (2018) found that the tendency to underestimate the temporal interval between a self-initiated action and a subsequent visual stimulus is more pronounced when the nature of the visual stimulus is a meaningful part in a plausible sequence of events (e.g., an image of a hand about to slap a table surface, followed by an image of the same hand touching the surface).…”

“…The most minimal way to test for a potential effect of irrelevant contextual information consists in the implementation of a naturalistic scene in which the stimuli are embedded. The use of more realistic stimuli has been proposed earlier (Riemer et al, 2018;Roseboom et al, 2019;Schlichting et al, 2018;van Rijn, 2014), and a recent study suggested that the temporal context effect-an effect that is associated with memory impairments (Maaß et al, 2019)-is more pronounced when probed with naturalistic compared with abstract stimuli (Maaß et al, 2021).…”

Partially Separable Aspects of Spatial and Temporal Estimations in Virtual Navigation as Revealed by Adaptation

“…Evidence supporting this hypothesis comes from multiple behavioural studies examining the interference effect between the perception of space and time. Their findings suggest that humans are unable to ignore irrelevant spatial information when estimating time ( Brunec et al, 2017 ; Brunec et al, 2020 ; Casasanto et al, 2010 ; Casasanto & Boroditsky, 2008 ) and cannot ignore irrelevant temporal information when estimating space ( Cai & Connell, 2015 ; Cai & Wang, 2021 ; Riemer et al, 2018 ). In addition to behavioural findings, multiple neuroimaging studies have suggested that a common neural mechanism is responsible for spatial and temporal processing.…”

“…However, the extent to which the abovementioned domains overlap, as well as their specific mechanisms, remains to be clarified. For example, it has been shown that the interference effect between spatial and temporal perceptions is often asymmetric; in many cases, the perception of time is influenced by spatial information, while the perception of space is less or not affected by temporal information ( Casasanto et al, 2010 ; Casasanto & Boroditsky, 2008 ; Riemer et al, 2018 ). These findings suggest that, while these two dimensions are indeed related to each other, their processing mechanisms are to some extent separable.…”

“…Among spatial and temporal perception, accurately estimating the distance and time of one's self-motion is crucial for navigation ( Glasauer et al, 2007 ). Recently, based on the above findings on the processing of space and time as a magnitude estimation, the characteristics of the estimation of distance and time, and their neural substrates, have been studied using the virtual reality (VR) environment in humans and rodents ( Kautzky & Thurley, 2016 ; Petzschner & Glasauer, 2011 ; Riemer et al, 2018 ; Robinson et al, 2019 ; Robinson & Wiener, 2021 ; Thurley & Schild, 2018 ; Wiener et al, 2016 ). In the virtual distance reproduction task, participants moved a specific distance or time in the VR environment and then reproduced the distance or time ( Petzschner & Glasauer, 2011 ; Robinson & Wiener, 2021 ; Thurley & Schild, 2018 ; Wiener et al, 2016 ).…”