Working Memory for Time Intervals
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1
University College London, Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging, United Kingdom
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2
Newcastle University, Institute of Neuroscience, United Kingdom
The brain can hold information about multiple environmental objects in working memory. It is not known, however, if time intervals can be treated similarly as a “sensory object” and stored in memory as distinct items.
Here, we developed a novel paradigm to examine memory for time intervals embedded in sequences that mimic the temporal characteristics of natural sounds such as speech and music. Listeners were required to remember and match the duration of a probed interval from a sequence of intervals and the precision of the response was evaluated as an index of memory. In a series of experiments, we demonstrate that performance is robust and varies as a function of the temporal structure of the sequences (better memory in regular vs. irregular sequences), the inter-onset intervals (better memory for sub-second vs. supra-second intervals) and working memory load (worse memory for higher load) but is invariant to attentional cueing, contrary to standard results from vision or audition.
Our data represent the first systematic characterization of memory for time intervals in naturalistic sound sequences that goes beyond previous work based on single intervals. We show that memory for time critically depends on a range of factors not considered in previous research and establish a new framework for sensory analysis of time. The work supports the hypothesis that time intervals in working memory are allocated a resource according to the amount of other information in a temporal sequence.
Results from an ongoing sparse functional MRI experiment designed to examine the brain substrates involved in encoding memory for time intervals will be presented. A parametric analysis will be performed to look for areas that encode time intervals into memory as a function of jitter and working memory load with an a priori hypothesis for a critical role for the basal ganglia, cerebellum and the prefrontal cortex (Teki et al., 2011; 2012).
References
Teki, S., Grube, M., Kumar, S., and Griffiths, T.D. (2011). Distinct neural substrates of duration-based and beat-based auditory timing. J. Neurosci. 31, 3805–3812.
Teki, S., Grube, M., and Griffiths, T.D. (2012). A unified model of time perception accounts for duration-based and beat-based timing mechanisms. Front. Integr. Neurosci. 5, 90.
Keywords:
interval timing,
Time Perception,
time perception and timing,
Rhythm perception,
working memory,
Psychophysics,
fMRI
Conference:
14th Rhythm Production and Perception Workshop Birmingham 11th - 13th September 2013, Birmingham, United Kingdom, 11 Sep - 13 Sep, 2013.
Presentation Type:
Oral Presentation
Topic:
Rhythm Production and Perception
Citation:
Teki
S and
Griffiths
TD
(2013). Working Memory for Time Intervals.
Conference Abstract:
14th Rhythm Production and Perception Workshop Birmingham 11th - 13th September 2013.
doi: 10.3389/conf.fnhum.2013.214.00014
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Received:
20 Jul 2013;
Published Online:
24 Sep 2013.
*
Correspondence:
Mr. Sundeep Teki, University College London, Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging, London, United Kingdom, sundeep.teki.10@ucl.ac.uk