When time stands still: Fear-specific modulation of temporal bias due to threat.

Abstract

The current study was designed to test the fear-specific nature of temporal bias due to threat. A temporal bisection procedure was used in which participants (N = 46) were initially trained to recognize short (400 ms) and long (1,600 ms) standard durations. In the test phase, participants were asked to judge whether the duration of computer-generated faces drawn to appear threatening, fearful, and neutral, was closer to either the short or long duration they had learnt earlier. Past research was replicated-the durations of the arousing facial expressions were overestimated relative to a low arousal (neutral) expression. Overestimation for threat was positively correlated with individual differences in fearfulness, trait anxiety, and distress. Multiple regression analyses were carried out to test the hypothesis was that individual differences in anxiety and fearfulness but not other traits would uniquely predict temporal overestimation due to threat. The results showed that fearfulness but not other traits (trait anxiety, anger, distress, activity, and sociability) was a unique and strong (partial r = .47) predictor of increased overestimation for both threatening and fearful expressions. The findings support the hypothesis that threat-related expressions activate a fear-specific system (Öhman & Mineka, 2001) or fear representations (Beck & Clark, 1997) in fearful individuals.

Clock Speed as a Window into Dopaminergic Control of Emotion and Time Perception

“…A consistent finding is that individuals overestimate the duration of faces expressing states of high arousal (e.g., angry expressions) and moreover, this effect is increased in individuals with high levels of anxiety and self-reported fearfulness (Bar-Haim et al, 2010;Tipples, 2008Tipples, , 2011Tipples, , 2015. For angry facial expressions this pattern has been replicated by the same research group and also, separate research groups (for a review see; Droit-Volet, 2013; Droit-Volet et al, 2013) using different tasks (Gil & DroitVolet, 2011).…”

“…In this sense, attention and timing are viewed as being tightly linked (Meck & Benson, 2002), although it's possible to have one without the other (e.g., and to dissociate some aspects of attention from changes in clock speed (e.g., Buhusi, 2003;Buhusi & Meck, 2002, 2006, 2009bLake & Meck, 2013;Penney et al, 1996;Tipples, 2008Tipples, , 2010Tipples, , 2011Tipples, , 2015.…”

Rapid temporal accumulation in spider fear: Evidence from hierarchical drift diffusion modelling.

“…4 specific phobia (Buetti & Lleras, 2012;Watts & Sharrock, 1984) and anxiety (Bar-Haim, Kerem, Lamy, & Zakay, 2010;Tipples, 2011). For example, spider fearful individuals perceive the duration of spiders to be longer than low arousal stimuli (Buetti & Lleras, 2012).…”

Internet and Facebook related images affect the perception of time

“…Furthermore, negative stimuli can accelerate the pacemaker and lead to temporal overestimation compared to positive or neutral stimuli (e.g. Droit-Volet and Meck, 2007;Tipples, 2008;Tipples, 2011). In addition, attention can also have an impact on our time perception (Thomas & Weaver, 1975;Zakay & Block, 1996).…”