Judgment of Filled and Unfilled Durations: Intersensory Factors

Abstract

Previous studies have shown a consistent intersensory difference in absolute judgments of the duration of continuous auditory and visual inputs. More visual than auditory clock time was judged equivalent to specific temporal concepts. Two experiments investigated this intersensory phenomenon further by comparing the judgments of filled auditory and visual durations with the estimation of unfilled intervals bounded by discrete lights and sounds. Auditory durations were judged longer than visual for the filled and unfilled conditions, and filled auditory durations were judged longer than unfilled auditory intervals The intersensory difference in time judgment was independent of stimulus pattern while the filled-unfilled difference was dependent upon sense mode, order effects and internal temporal standard. Stimulus properties must be considered when interpreting the results of time judgment research.