Temporal information processing in male and female subjects

There is accumulating evidence that estimation of durations in the range of seconds or above is based on cognitive representations, whereas processing of extremely brief durations in the range of milliseconds appears to be of a highly sensory nature and beyond cognitive control. Therefore, in Experiment 1, seventeen male and seventeen female subjects had to reproduce 5-, 15-, and 40-second auditory intervals, while in Experiment 2 twenty-four mate and twenty-four female subjects had to decide which of two empty auditory intervals, ranging from 50 to 98 milliseconds, was longer. Male subjects showed superior performance on reproducing intervals as compared to female subjects who overestimated 5-, 15-, and 40-second time intervals much more than the male subjects. However, no differences were found in temporal discrimination of brief durations. These results were replicated in Experiment 3 applying a within-subjects design. The present findings suggest superior performance on processing of durations in the range of seconds in male than in female subjects due to sex-related differences in cognitive representation of temporal information in memory. Furthermore, distinct timing mechanisms that may account for differential effects of sex on temporal information processing are discussed.