時間統計規律性促進時間感判斷：跨感官不對稱效果

Abstract

時間訊息使我們能整合各式各樣的事件並做出預測。前人探討“節奏時間知覺 (時間統計規律性)”以及“時距時間知覺 (時間感判斷)”間關係的研究中顯示請參與者做聽覺時間感判斷時，比起不規則的聲音，若將目標聲音區間接續在以固定時間間隔出現、具有時間規律性的喀噠聲之後播放，參與者的表現較好。越來越多的證據指出，知覺作業中若目標刺激接在時間間隔規律的事件之後出現，會使參與者更能偵測與分辨出該目標，且這可能是透過一種可影響多種感官的機制所達成。然而，目前尚不清楚時間統計規律性是否可透過類似的機制跨感官地影響其他感官的時間感，亦或此種促進效果僅侷限在單一感官中。更者，從時間解析度不同的感官訊息中所抽取出的時間統計規律性，是否會因此對於時間感有不同程度的影響(例如聽覺比視覺訊息的時間解析度好，是否因此聽覺統計規律性對時間感影響較大)，目前也尚待驗證。為探討上述議題，本研究共執行了五個實驗，其中實驗一使用純視覺刺激，其他實驗使用視覺與聽覺刺激。參與者須在時間間隔規律(具時間統計規律性)或不規律的刺激序列出現之後，比較隨後依序出現的兩個目標刺激何者呈現的時間較長(時間感判斷)。實驗結果顯示，規律的視覺刺激可以促進視覺時間感判斷(實驗一)，卻未能促進聽覺時間感判斷(實驗二)，即使以測驗要求參與者注意目標聲音出現前的視覺序列是否具有時間規律性，仍無跨感官的促進效果(實驗三)。相較之下，規律的聽覺刺激在參與者有特別注意其時間結構的規律性時，能夠跨感官地促進視覺的時間感判斷(實驗四)，而這樣的促進效果在參與者較不注意聽覺序列的時間結構時即消失(實驗五)。綜觀而言，本篇研究闡明了時間統計規律性可跨感官地促進時間感的判斷，而視覺與聽覺的時間統計規律性，對彼此感官時間感影響的不對稱性，更支持了時間解析度較好的感官(聽覺)所提供的訊息，對於時間估計的判斷也更為重要。 關鍵詞: 時間統計規律性；時間感；視覺規律性；聽覺規律性；跨感官效果

Temporal information enables us to integrate events and make predictions. By examining the relationship between beat-based timing (temporal regularity) and duration-based timing (duration judgement) mechanisms, previous research has shown better performance in auditory duration judgement when the target durations were preceded by a regular auditory click sequence than by an irregular one. Increasing evidence suggests that preceding rhythmic context makes sensory targets more detectable and discriminable, which may be mediated by a supramodal mechanism. Yet little is known about whether the facilitation effect of temporal regularity on duration judgment is supramodal or is constricted within a single modality. Moreover, whether rhythmic information extracted from different modalities with varied temporal resolutions is weighted differently (e.g., whether audition weights more since it has a better resolution than vision) also needs to be examined. To resolve this issue, the present study conducted five experiments using visual and/or auditory stimuli. Participants were required to compare two durations preceded by a regular or an irregular sequence. The results revealed that visual temporal regularity facilitated visual duration judgment (Experiment 1) but not auditory duration judgment (Experiment 2) even when participants explicitly paid attention to the rhythmic structures of the preceding sequences (Experiment 3). By contrast, auditory temporal regularity facilitated visual duration judgment with attention deployed to the temporal structure (Experiment 4) and this cross-modal effect vanished without attention (Experiment 5). Overall, the present study demonstrated that temporal regularity can cross-modally boost duration judgments, while the finding of the asymmetric audio-visual effect supports the view that information with better temporal precision is weighted more heavily in time estimation. Keywords: temporal regularity; time perception; visual rhythms; auditory rhythms; cross-modal effect