Effects of body core temperature and brain dopamine activity on timing processes in humans

Abstract

In a placebo-controlled study, the effects of experimentally induced increase in body core temperature and of the dopamine antagonist haloperidol on judgments of an apparent second, a speeded-tapping task, and temporal discrimination of intervals in the range of milliseconds and seconds were investigated in 40 healthy male subjects. A 0.7 °C-increase in body core temperature due to 3-h exposure to an ambient temperature of 52 °C did not cause any statistically significant changes in timing tasks. Unlike heat exposure, 3 mg of haloperidol caused a pronounced impairment of performance on the temporal discrimination of intervals in the range of milliseconds and seconds ( P < 0.01 and P < 0.001, respectively) as well as speeded tapping ( P < 0.05). For temporal discrimination of intervals in the range of seconds, a significant interaction between ambient temperature and haloperidol could be established ( P < 0.05) indicating that haloperidol caused a significant performance decrement only in subjects exposed to an ambient temperature of 28 °C but not in those exposed to 52 °C. The overall pattern of results suggests that temporal processing of intervals in the range of milliseconds can be considered a function of dopaminergic activity in the basal ganglia while temporal processing of longer intervals appears to be cognitively mediated. Furthermore, the hypothesis that timing processes in humans are modulated by changes in body core temperature could not be established.