Time judgment as a function of electroencephalographic activity

Forty-eight male college students made time judgments of 2- and 8-sec intervals under four experimental conditions with photic stimulation selected to alter frequency (wave-count) of EEG activity. The results indicate that subjects with more than 50 per cent alpha in their eyes-closed resting EEG overestimated time in the eyes-open condition in contrast to those subjects with less than 50 per cent alpha. Intermittent photic stimulation resulted in underestimation of the 8-sec interval only. This was not due to changes induced in the EEG. Correlation of wave-count scores and time estimations showed the predicted inverse relation between increased relative frequency of the EEG and underestimation of temporal experience. This investigation has demonstrated that EEG activity is related to estimation of short temporal intervals.