Spatiotemporal biases in manual interception
Mon-A6-Talk II-03
Presented by: Anna Schroeger
Human processing of space and time is by far not unbiased but instead prone to errors. For example, spatial features (e.g., distance between two objects) can bias time processing (e.g., duration judgements) and potentially vice versa (e.g., kappa and tau effects). In a series of experiments, we i) tested whether such effects transfer to an action task (i.e., interception) and ii) aimed to address the role of sensory input. We repeatedly presented either a white dot or a sinusoidal tone, moving from left to right with each presentation, thereby forming spatial and temporal intervals between presentations. Participants were asked to predict and intercept the next presentation location and time. We found that increasing the time between sound presentations shifted participants interception location in movement direction. This indicates an effect from time on space for the auditory modality. For the visual presentation, results were mixed. Depending on factors like presentation duration, the number of repetitions and the combination of spatial and temporal intervals, either no effects, or a reversed effect from time on space (i.e., interception location shifted backwards with increasing time) together with an expected effect of space on time (delayed interception for increasing spatial intervals) were found. This variability in effects might be explained by differences in the precision of spatial and temporal representations. The results are interpreted in relation to the representational noise account and compared with similar biases like the Representational-Momentum or Fröhlich Effect.
Keywords: spatiotemporal bias, interception, kappa, tau