Spontaneous Motor Tempo Research Articles

Late onset of age-related difference in unpaced tapping with no age-related difference in phase-shift error detection and correction.

An age-related difference in accuracy and variability of unpaced timing tasks suggests that the internal clock for the processing of intervals of hundreds of milliseconds slows down with age. However, we recently found that sensorimotor synchronization (SMS) error detection and correction abilities are preserved into the ninth and tenth decades, although fastest tapping rate decreases (Turgeon, Wing, & Taylor, 2011). Further testing with the same sample of participants in the present study provides evidence for slowing of the internal clock with age. We report an age-related decrease in spontaneous motor tempo (SMT), an age-related increase in produced period when estimating target durations of 500 ms and 1000 ms, and an age-related increase in "clock variance" in continuing tapping intervals ranging from 300 ms to 900 ms. The profile of age-related difference across the 2 studies suggests a late onset, starting in the ninth decade, of clock slowing without age-related difference in timing error monitoring. The finding that unpaced timing is affected by age, whereas paced timing involved in SMS is not, suggests separate underlying mechanisms for internally generated intervals and monitoring of external timing errors.

Double Dissociation of Dopamine Genes and Timing in Humans

A number of lines of evidence implicate dopamine in timing [Rammsayer, T. H. Neuropharmacological approaches to human timing. In S. Grondin (Ed.), Psychology of time (pp. 295-320). Bingley, UK: Emerald, 2008; Meck, W. H. Neuropharmacology of timing and time perception. Brain Research, Cognitive Brain Research, 3, 227-242, 1996]. Two human genetic polymorphisms are known to modulate dopaminergic activity. DRD2/ANKK1-Taq1a is a D(2) receptor polymorphism associated with decreased D(2) density in the striatum [Jönsson, E. G., Nothen, M. M., Grunhage, F., Farde, L., Nakashima, Y., Propping, P., et al. Polymorphisms in the dopamine D(2) receptor gene and their relationships to striatal dopamine receptor density of healthy volunteers. Molecular Psychiatry, 4, 290-296, 1999]; COMT Val158Met is a functional polymorphism associated with increased activity of the COMT enzyme such that catabolism of synaptic dopamine is greater in pFC [Meyer-Lindenberg, A., Kohn, P. D., Kolachana, B., Kippenhan, S., McInerney-Leo, A., Nussbaum, R., et al. Midbrain dopamine and prefrontal function in humans: Interaction and modulation by COMT genotype. Nature Neuroscience, 8, 594-596, 2005]. To investigate the role of dopamine in timing, we genotyped 65 individuals for DRD2/ANKK1-Taq1a, COMT Val158Met, and a third polymorphism, BDNF Val66Met, a functional polymorphism affecting the expression of brain-derived neurotrophic factor [Egan, M. F., Kojima, M., Callicott, J. H., Goldberg, T. E., Kolachana, B. S., Bertolino, A., et al. The BDNF val66met polymorphism affects activity-dependent secretion of BDNF and human memory and hippocampal function. Cell, 112, 257-269, 2003]. Subjects were tested on a temporal discrimination task with sub- and supra-second intervals (500- and 2000-msec standards) as well as a spontaneous motor tempo task. We found a double dissociation for temporal discrimination: the DRD2/ANKK1-Taq1a polymorphism (A1+ allele) was associated with significantly greater variability for the 500-msec duration only, whereas the COMT Val158Met polymorphism (Val/Val homozygotes) was associated with significantly greater variability for the 2000-msec duration only. No differences were detected for the BDNF Vall66Met variant. Additionally, the DRD2/ANKK1-Taq1a polymorphism was associated with a significantly slower preferred motor tempo. These data provide a potential biological basis for the distinctions between sub- and supra-second timing and suggest that BG are integral for the former whereas pFC is implicated in the latter.

The impact of basal ganglia lesions on sensorimotor synchronization, spontaneous motor tempo, and the detection of tempo changes

The basal ganglia (BG) are part of extensive subcortico-cortical circuits that are involved in a variety of motor and non-motor cognitive functions. Accumulating evidence suggests that one specific function that engages the BG and associated cortico-striato-thalamo-cortical circuitry is temporal processing, i.e., the mechanisms that underlie the encoding, decoding and evaluation of temporal relations or temporal structure. In the current study we investigated the interplay of two processes that require precise representations of temporal structure, namely the perception of an auditory pacing signal and manual motor production by means of finger tapping in a sensorimotor synchronization task. Patients with focal lesions of the BG and healthy control participants were asked to align finger taps to tone sequences that either did or did not contain a tempo acceleration or tempo deceleration at a predefined position, and to continue tapping at the final tempo after the pacing sequence had ceased. Performance in this adaptive synchronization-continuation paradigm differed between the two groups. Selective damage to the BG affected the abilities to detect tempo changes and to perform attention-dependent error correction, particularly in response to tempo decelerations. An additional assessment of preferred spontaneous, i.e., unpaced but regular, production rates yielded more heterogeneous results in the patient group. Together these findings provide evidence for less efficient processing in the perception and the production of temporal structure in patients with focal BG lesions. The results also support the functional role of the BG system in attention-dependent temporal processing.

Joint drumming: Social context facilitates synchronization in preschool children

The human capacity to synchronize body movements to an external acoustic beat enables uniquely human behaviors such as music making and dancing. By hypothesis, these first evolved in human cultures as fundamentally social activities. We therefore hypothesized that children would spontaneously synchronize their body movements to an external beat at earlier ages and with higher accuracy if the stimulus was presented in a social context. A total of 36 children in three age groups (2.5, 3.5, and 4.5 years) were invited to drum along with either a human partner, a drumming machine, or a drum sound coming from a speaker. When drumming with a social partner, children as young as 2.5 years adjusted their drumming tempo to a beat outside the range of their spontaneous motor tempo. Moreover, children of all ages synchronized their drumming with higher accuracy in the social condition. We argue that drumming together with a social partner creates a shared representation of the joint action task and/or elicits a specific human motivation to synchronize movements during joint rhythmic activity.

Influence of auditory tempo on the endogenous rhythm of non-nutritive sucking

The aim of this study was to examine the perception of time in the first months of life. Does the perception of contextual temporal information (an auditory tempo) induce modifications in spontaneous motor behavior (in the present case, non-nutritive sucking behavior) at birth and at 2 months? Two auditory tempos were successively tested. The first was the same as the previously recorded spontaneous motor tempo (SMT); the second was 15% faster or 15% slower than the infant's SMT according to the group. Results showed that modification of the sucking tempo depended on age and contextual temporal information. Two-month-old infants were able to adapt their endogenous sucking rhythm to an external tempo if it was faster than their spontaneous rhythm. Results also confirmed that slowing down the sucking rate was difficult for both groups of infants. In sum, the results suggest that, to a certain extent, very young infants are sensitive to contextual modifications (which indicates that they perceive them). This study has thus identified certain features of the internal time base rate from birth which could help define a developmental internal clock model of contextual temporal processing.

Differential involvement of internal clock and working memory in the production and reproduction of duration: A study on older adults

The present study uses the inter-individual variability in time perception of a group of elderly participants to differentiate the processes underlying time production and time reproduction. Participants performed duration production and reproduction tasks. They were also administered working memory tests and a spontaneous motor tempo task. The findings suggest that duration production and duration reproduction involve different mechanisms. Correlational analyses revealed a double dissociation: production was only correlated with spontaneous motor tempo and reproduction only with working memory measures. These findings suggest that the internal clock rate modulates the production of duration and that reproduced duration varies according to working memory capacities.

Age-Related Cognitive Slowing: The Role of Spontaneous Tempo and Processing Speed

This research studied the relationships between two types of slowing observed in aging—loss of general processing speed and slowing of spontaneous tempo—in an attempt to test the assumption that there is an internal timing mechanism responsible for cognitive age-related decrease. Processing speed has been evaluated as a mediator of the relationship between age and working memory, concurrently with spontaneous tempo measures. The authors compared the performance of young and older adults on tasks involving spontaneous motor tempo, processing speed, and working memory. The findings confirmed the agerelated slowing of spontaneous motor tempo but did not indicate superiority of tempo mediation in the decline in working memory. Processing speed appeared to be a major mediator of working memory, but also of spontaneous tempo slowing.

Age-Related Changes in the Spontaneous Motor Rhythms of theSenescence-Accelerated Mouse (SAMP8)

The present study examined the effect of age on the spontaneous motor rhythms of mice during wheel running. The spontaneous motor tempo (SMT) of wheel running was measured for the P8 strain of the senescence-accelerated mouse (SAMP8) by recording the sequence of time intervals (measured in milliseconds) for successive revolutions of a run-wheel over the course of 16 days. Analyses of the distribution of interrevolution intervals of 2-, 7-, and 12-month-old SAMP8 revealed an age-related slowing of wheel running and a corresponding increase in variability consistent with Weber's law. All three age groups also demonstrated a practice effect over the course of testing best described by a power law. These findings provide evidence of age-related changes in the spontaneous motor rhythms of the SAMP8 that occur as early as 7 months of age. The results are consistent with age-related changes in human subjects and suggest that spontaneous wheel-running behavior in rodents may be a good model for studying SMT.

Spontaneous motor tempo and rhythmical synchronisation in 2½- and 4-year-old children

Spontaneous motor tempo and rhythmical synchronisation were studied in 2½- to 4-year-old children. Children were tested in three sessions, each of which included three consecutive tasks: first, spontaneous manual tapping tempo, second, synchronisation to external tempo, followed by spontaneous manual tapping tempo again. Results showed that regular spontaneous manual tapping tempo could be observed in children as young as 2½ years. Moreover, children could slow down their tap rhythm when the auditory stimulation became slower. Anticipating sound and adjusting their motor response to time interval was easier for children at the age of 4 years than for younger children. Consequently, it seems easier for the former to estimate the time interval than for the latter. Data referring to different clock models and new perspectives to conduct research on temporal studies in child development will be discussed.

The development of rhythmic attending in auditory sequences: attunement, referent period, focal attending

This paper is divided into three sections. The first section is theoretical; it extends Dynamic Attending Theory (Jones, M. R. Psychological Review 83 (1976) 323; Jones, M. R. Perception and Psychophysics 41(6) (1987) 631; Jones, M. R. Psychomusicology 9(2) (1990) 193; Jones, M. R., & Boltz, M. Psychological Review 96(3) (1989) 459) to developmental questions concerning tempo and time hierarchies. Generally Dynamic Attending Theory proposes that, when listening to a complex auditory sequence, listeners spontaneously focus on events occurring at an intermediate rate (the referent level), and they then may shift attention to events occurring over longer or shorter time spans, that is at lower (faster) or higher (slower) hierarchical levels (focal attending). The second section of the paper is experimental. It examines maturational changes of three dynamic attending activities involving referent period and level, attunement, and focal attending. Tasks involve both motor tapping (including spontaneous motor tempo and synchronization with simple sequences and music) and tempo discrimination. We compare performances by 4-, 6-, 8-, and 10-year-old children and adults, with or without musical training. Results indicate three changes with increased age and musical training: (1) a slowing of the mean spontaneous tapping rate (a reflection of the referent period) and mean synchronization rate (a reflection of the referent level), (2) enhanced ability to synchronize tapping and discriminate tempo (improved attunement), and (3) an enlarged range of tapping rates towards slower rates and higher hierarchical levels (improved focal attending). A final section considers results in light of the theory proposed here. It is suggested that growth trends can be expressed in terms of listeners' engagement of slower attending oscillators with age and experience, accompanied by the passage from the initial use of a single oscillator towards the coupling of multiple oscillators.

Children tap faster and within a smaller tempo window than adults

Dynamic Attending Theory [Jones (1976)] proposes that, when listening to auditory sequences, listeners adapt their internal rhythms to those in the sequence (attunement), spontaneously focusing on events occurring at intermediate rates (referent level), and shifting attention to events occurring at faster or slower hierarchical levels (focal attending). The development of these abilities with age and musical training is examined by comparing motor tapping in 4-, 6-, 8-, and 10-year-old children and adults, with or without musical training. Seven motor tapping tasks (including spontaneous motor tempo and synchronization with simple sequences and music) revealed three changes with increased age and musical training: (1) a slowing of mean tapping rate (a reflection of referent period) and mean synchronization rate (a reflection of referent level); (2) an increase in range of tapping rates toward slower rates (improved focal attending); and (3) a greater ability to adapt the taps to sequence structure, in particular incorporating a greater use of the hierarchical structure (improved attunement and focal attending). Interpreted in terms of attentional oscillators, these results suggest that increased interaction and experience with a particular type of sequence facilitate the passage from the initial use of a single oscillator toward the coupling of multiple oscillators.

Pratique musicale et régulations temporelles

Summary: Musical expertise and temporal regulation. Recently, a number of experiments have been conducted to test the hypothesis that an internal clock mediates estimation and reproduction of time. We attempted to separate possible biological and cognitive components by comparing experts' and novices' performances in an experiment that requires isochronous rhythmic behaviours. Expert subjects (high-level pianists, percussionists, and singers) and novices completed three tasks : (a) Spontaneous Motor Tempo Task (SMT) ; (b) continuation task for which a sequence of 3 or 7 isochronous « inductor stimuli » had to be continued, with the inter-stimuli interval (ISI) being 400, 600 or 800 ms ; (c) synchronization task for which the ISI was 400, 600 and 800 ms. Contrary to previous assumptions, for the SMT the average inter-response interval (IRI) of 600 ms was not obtained with novices or with experts. In the continuation task, the number of inductors did not affect the subjects' performances, and a difference in the variability of the IRI was observed between experts and novices, mainly at the end of their sequence of taps. In the synchronization task, the variability of IRI was greater when the tempo was slower ; the novices were significantly less regular thon the experts. The particularly regular behaviour of percussionists suggests a reconsideration of the respective contribution of the biological, cognitive and motor components of temporal adjustments. Key words : isochronous rhythms, synchronization, musical expertise.