It’s About Time: Studying the Encoding of Duration

Abstract

Processing temporal information is crucial when interacting with the external world. Analyzing the temporal properties of an event, such as its duration and the rate at which things change, allows us to learn about temporal regularities in the world around us. We use this knowledge to predict future events, guide our decisions, and plan the timing of our actions. In addition, it also allows us to track our behavior and synchronize our interactions with our environment so that we can perform complicated behavioral tasks that require precise timing. Despite the importance of using temporal information to guide behavior, the process by which we extract and code temporal information is poorly understood. In this thesis, we investigate both duration and temporal frequency processing. Chapters 2-4 focus on duration processing by investigating the way in which duration information is encoded from visual information. We used duration adaptation paradigms to probe the encoding of duration and aimed to better understand duration-tuned mechanisms proposed to underlie duration processing. We aimed to answer questions about the relative position of duration-tuned mechanisms in the (visual) processing hierarchy, the nature of the sensory signals that duration-tuned mechanisms respond to, and how the responses of duration-tuned mechanisms are modulated by attentional demands. In chapter 5 we present a study on temporal frequency processing in which we investigate the way in which temporal frequency information is maintained during periods when the source of information is absent. Together, these studies expand our knowledge on duration encoding and temporal frequency processing, while also providing more insight into novel paradigms that can be used to study these forms of temporal processing.