time perception in action settings

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Andrea Kiesel
• Subject Area: General, Cognitive and Mathematical Psychology
• Term: from 2009 to 2019
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 162351989

Time perception in action settings is biased. Participants judge the occurrence of a voluntary action latter and the occurrence of a self-produced action effect earlier than the occurrence of an action without effect or the occurrence of a stimulus without prior action (e.g., Haggard, Aschersleben, Gehrke, & Prinz, 2002). This effect is called intentional binding effect and presumably occurs because of a binding mechanism that takes places between an intentional action and an intended effect. In the first project part, we applied a psychophysical method - the method of constant stimuli - to verify that the interval between action and effect is perceived shorter when an action causes an effect. With this method, we were able to demonstrate that action-effect intervals are perceived shorter irrespective of whether participants perform a voluntary action or a stimulus-instructed response to produce the effect. In addition, we demonstrated that time perception does not depend on whether the identity of the action effect or the action-effect interval is predictable or not. Finally, we showed that time perception in action settings is closely related to the feeling to have caused an effect, thus to sense of agency. In the second project phase, we aim to investigate whether time perception of action-effect intervals and sense of agency depend on the variability of action-effect episodes. Additionally, we aim to elaborate the impact of learning processes regarding the time point of an effect on time perception and sense of agency. And finally we are interested in the impact of top-down strategical knowledge on time perception of actions and effects.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants