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Research Institute for Life Course Studies

Professor John Wearden

Title: Professor in Psychology
Phone: (+44) 01782 7 33391
Email: j.h.wearden@psy.keele.ac.uk
Room: DH1.73
Roles: Professor
School of Psychology

 

 

Background and Research Interests:

For the last 15-20 years I have worked more or less exclusively on the perception of time. A specific area of interest has been the application of scalar timing theory (SET), originally developed as an explanation of timing in animals, to studies of time perception in humans. SET is an internal-clock-based model of timing, but in addition involves short- and long-term memory components, and decision processes. My research has investigated all these areas: studies of "speeding up" and "slowing down" the pacemaker of the clock (both with adults and children), studies of working memory and "reference" memory for duration, and manipulation of decision processes involved in timing. The most recent research involves attempts to control the operation of the putative internal clock, work on all sorts of memory for duration, and attempts to manipulate the "references" that people use when making time judgements. I have been involved in studies of timing in children, elderly people, patients with Parkinson's disease and, most recently, schizophrenia. An additional area of interest is animal timing. Although I do not carry out experiments on animals, I am engaged in computer and mathematical models of animal timing, as well as other theoretical issues. In general, a substantial proportion of my output is theoretical, mainly using computer modelling to test theories derived from SET, but also other areas such as modelling the process of chronometric counting. I have long-standing collaborations with researchers at the University of Liège in Belgium , and the University Blaise-Pascal in Clermont-Ferrand , France , and have recently begun a collaboration with researchers at the Hopital St. Anne in Paris .

I hope to begin an extensive research programme on timing in the elderly, in particular the question of why distortions of subjective time in everyday life are so frequently mentioned by old people, and what these reports mean. Conventional laboratory studies of timing in the elderly find fairly consistent, albeit small, changes in time perception with age, albeit changes which seem far too slight to account for the subjective reports of older people. In a recent article, I have argued that much previous research on timing in old people (including my own) is "barking up the wrong tree", and that novel methodologies are needed if old people's time experiences are to be properly understood. Some work in this area can be done with student participants, and preliminary data on some potentially relevant variables has already been collected.

Key Publications:

Pre 2000

  • Ferrara, A., Lejeune, H., & Wearden, J. H. (1997). Changing sensitivity to duration in human scalar timing: An experiment, a review, and some possible explanations .Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology , 50B , 217-237. (pdf)
  • Lejeune, H., & Wearden, J.H. (1991). The comparative psychology of fixed-interval responding: Some quantitative analyses. Learning and Motivation , 22 , 84-111. (pdf)
  • Penton-Voak, I.S., Edwards, H., Percival, A., & Wearden, J.H. (1996). Speeding up an internal clock in humans? Effects of click trains on subjective duration. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 22, 307-320. (pfd)
  • Wearden, J.H. (1991). Do humans possess an internal clock with scalar timing properties? Learning and Motivation , 22 , 59-83. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H. (1999). "Beyond the fields we know...": Exploring and developing scalar timing theory. Behavioural Processes , 45 , 3-21. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H., & Ferrara, A. (1996). Stimulus range effects in temporal bisection by humans. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology , 49B , 24-44. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H., Edwards, H., Fakhri, M., & Percival, A. (1998). Why "sounds are judged longer than lights": Application of a model of the internal clock in humans. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology , 51B , 97-120. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H., Pilkington, R., & E. Carter (1999). "Subjective lengthening" during repeated testing of a simple temporal discrimination. Behavioural Processes, 46, 25-38. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H, Wearden, A.J., & Rabbitt, P. (1997). Age and IQ effects on stimulus and response timing. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 23 , 962-979. (pdf)

2001

  • Vanneste, S., Pouthas, V., & Wearden, J.H. (2001). Temporal control of rhythmic performance: A comparison between young and old adults. Experimental Aging Research, 27, 83-102.
  • Wearden, J.H. (2001). Internal clocks and the representation of time. In C. Hoerl & T. McCormack (Eds.), Time and memory: Issues in philosophy and psychology (pp. 37- 58). Oxford: Clarendon Press.
  • Wearden, J. (2001). More clocks within us. In S. McCready (Ed.), The discovery of time (pp. 204-225). London: MQ Publications Ltd.
  • Droit-Volet, S., & Wearden, J.H. (2001). Temporal bisection in children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 80, 142-159. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H., & Bray, S. (2001). Scalar timing without reference memory: Episodic temporal generalization and bisection in humans. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 54B, 289-310. (pfd)
  • Droit-Volet, S., Clément, A., & Wearden, J.H. (2001). Temporal generalization in 3- to 8-year-old children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 80, 271-288. (pdf)

2002

  • Wearden, J.H., Parry, A., & Stamp, L. (2002). Is subjective shortening in human memory unique to time representations? Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 55B, 1-25. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H. (2002). Traveling in time: A time-left analogue for humans. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 28, 200-208. (pdf)
  • Droit-Volet, S., & Wearden, J. (2002). Speeding up an internal clock in children? Effects of visual flicker on subjective duration. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 55B, 193-211. (pdf)

2003

  • Wearden, J.H., & Grindrod, R. (2003). Manipulating decision processes in the human scalar timing system. Behavioural Processes, 61, 47-56. (pdf)
  • Droit-Volet. S., & Wearden, J. (2003). Les modèles d'horloge interne en psychologie du temps. L'Année Psychologique, 104, 617-654.
  • Whitaker, J.S., Lowe, C.F., & Wearden, J.H. (2003). Multiple-interval timing in rats: Performance on two-valued mixed fixed-interval schedules. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 29, 277-291. (pdf)
  • Jones, L.A., & Wearden, J.H. (2003). More is not necessarily better: Examining the nature of the temporal reference memory component in timing. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 56, 321-343. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H. (2003). Applying the scalar timing model to human time psychology: Progress and challenges. In H. Helfrich (Ed.), Time and Mind II: Information-processing perspectives (pp.21-39). Gottingen: Hogrefe & Huber. (pdf)

2004

  • Jones, L.A., & Wearden, J.H. (2004). Double standards: Memory loading in temporal reference memory. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 57B, 55-77. (pdf)
  • Blomeley, F.J., Lowe, C.F., & Wearden, J.H. (2004). Reinforcer concentration effects on a fixed-interval schedule. Behavioural Processes, 67, 55-66. (pdf)
  • Droit-Volet, S., Tourret, S., & Wearden, J. (2004). Perception of the duration of auditory and visual stimuli in children and adults. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 57, 797-818. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H. (2004). Decision processes in models of timing. Acta Neurobiologiae Experimentalis, 64, 303-317. (pdf)

2005

  • Wearden, J.H. (2005). Origines et développement des théories d'horloge interne du temps psychologique. Psychologie Francaise, 50, 7-25. (pdf)
  • McCormack, T., Wearden, J.H., Smith, M.C., & Brown, D.G.A. (2005). Episodic temporal generalization: A developmental study. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 58A, 693-704. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H. (2005). The wrong tree: Time perception and time experience in the elderly. In J. Duncan, L. Phillips, & P. McLeod (Eds.), Measuring the mind: Speed, age, and control (pp. 137-158). Oxford: Oxford University Press. (pdf)

2006

  • Wearden, J.H., & Lejeune, H. (2006). "The stone which the builders rejected": Delay of reinforcement and response rate on fixed-interval and related schedules. Behavioural Processes, 71, 77-87 (pdf)
  • Lejeune, H.,Richelle, M. & Wearden, J. (2006). About  Skinner and Time: Behaviour-analytic contributions to research on animal timing. Journal of the Experimental Analyses of Behaviour, 85,125-142. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H., Todd, N.P.M., & Jones, L.A. (2006). When do auditory/visual differences in duration judgements occur? Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 59, 1709-1724. (pdf)
  • Lejeune, H., & Wearden, J.H. (2006). Scalar properties in animal timing: conformity and violations. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 59, 1875-1908. (pdf)

2007

  • Wearden, J.H., & Jones, L.A. (2007). Is the growth of subjective time in humans a linear or non-linear function of real time? Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 60, 1289-1302. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H., Norton, R., Martin, S., & Montford-Bebb, O. (2007). Internal clock processes and the filled duration illusion. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 33, 716-729. (pdf)
  • Droit-Volet, S., Wearden, J., & Delgado-Yonger, M. (2007). Short-term memory for time in children and adults: A behavioral study and a model. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 97, 246-264. (pdf)
  • Wearden, J.H., & Farrar, R. (2007). Effects of feedback and calibration on the verbal estimation of the duration of tones. Acta Psychologica, 126, 1-17. (pdf)

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Last updated: 21.08.09