Common Words are Longer in Apparent Duration than are Rare Words

Abstract

Studies disagree regarding the relationship between word frequency and apparent duration. The present experiments evaluate factors that might explain conflict in prior studies. In Experiment 1, word frequency was manipulated factorially with three stimulus durations. High-frequency words were judged longer in duration than low-frequency words at each exposure duration. When briefer durations were used in Experiment 2, frequency did not affect subjective duration. In Experiment 3, a wider range of frequency restored the longer apparent duration of high-frequency words. Use of a postexposure mask lengthened duration judgments but did not interact with the frequency effect. Use of a paired comparison procedure in Experiment 4 again showed the frequency effect. The results are consistent with an attentional model that suggests that subjective time estimation is directly related to the amount of attention remaining to evaluate the passage of time once the stimulus target has been cognitively processed.

Time perception and word recognition: An elaboration of the time-criterion account

“…There were significant effects of word frequency and word length, with participants reporting longer exposure durations for the shorter and more frequent stimuli (i.e., time appeared to pass more rapidly when the participants were monitoring the duration of shorter and more frequent stimuli). Hochhaus et al (1991) replicated Warm and McCray's findings, using a range of exposure durations (17-1,075 msec) in a number of experiments, showing that this effect is reasonably robust.…”

“…The data from the internal-timing conditions in Experiments 1 and 2 clearly indicate that timing operations are affected by the nature of the stimulus being processed, so that time appears to pass more slowly when a difficult stimulus is being processed (see also Chastain & Ferraro, 1997;Hochhaus et al, 1991;Warm & McCray, 1969). The implication is that latency differences between stimuli that differ in difficulty (e.g., words and nonwords) when they are presented in a random order could, at least in part, be due to a timing mechanism working at different rates of speed in the two cases (together with a single time criterion).…”

“…Typically, the perceived duration of a presented interval is inversely related to the difficulty of the concurrent nontemporal task (e.g., Brown, 1985;Brown, Stubbs, & West, 1992;Casini & Macar, 1997;Chastain & Ferraro, 1997;Hicks, Miller, & Kinsbourne, 1976;Hochhaus, Swanson, & Carter, 1991;McClain, 1983;Thomas & Weaver, 1975;Warm & McCray, 1969). The articles most relevant to the present discussion about stimulus difficulty effects in word recognition are those by Warm and McCray, Hochhaus et al, and Chastain and Ferraro, because those researchers used words as stimuli.…”

“…It should be noted that prior investigations in which word stimuli were used (i.e., Chastain & Ferraro, 1997;Hochhaus et al, 1991;Warm & McCray, 1969) involved a duration estimation task (i.e., the stimuli were presented for a set period of time, and the participants had to estimate the length of that presentation time). Although this is a standard methodology, it is not the best way to investigate the potential link between stimulus difficulty and time perception in speeded tasks.…”

Sequential effects in time perception

“…Thus, time appears to pass more quickly when easy stimuli are processed. Similar results have been reported by Chastain and Ferraro (1997) and Hochhaus, Swanson, and Carter (1991), also using words as stimuli, as well as by a number of researchers using other tasks and stimuli (e.g., Brown, 1985;Brown, Stubbs, & West, 1992;Casini & Macar, 1997;Fortin, Rousseau, Bourque, & Kirouac, 1993;Hicks, Miller, & Kinsbourne, 1976;McClain, 1983;Thomas & Weaver, 1975).…”