Relationship between daily fluctuations of body temperature and the processing of sub-second intervals

Abstract

In 1933, Hoagland proposed that temporal processing was based on an internal clock controlled by a temperature-dependent chemical pacemaker. Several studies have tested this hypothesis, mainly using intervals above 1s, and the global picture about the impact of temperature remains unclear. The present study aims to investigate the relationship between daily fluctuations of body temperature and the processing of sub-second intervals. In a within-subject design, twelve university students performed a finger tapping task, a time reproduction task, and a time discrimination task at three different time of the day, 9am, 1pm and 5pm, and using four sub-seconds intervals (450, 550, 650 and 750ms). As expected, we observed different degrees of body temperature across the time of the day, with the lower temperature recorded in the morning and the higher in the late afternoon. Results showed that temporal performances were independent of body temperature, regardless of the temporal task used and of the standard interval tested, indicating that performances within the same temporal task were consistent across different temperature levels. Our study provides evidence that the abilities for processing very brief intervals are reliable across the time of the day and are not modulated by the body temperature.