Emotional influences on time perception

In studies on prospective time perception, a prolonging effect of arousal on time estimates is commonly reported for durations under 2s while the effect vanishes for longer intervals. In this study, we investigated how arousal and pleasure induced by aural stimuli varying in volume and valence influenced reproductions in the range from 1.1s to 5s. As expected, higher arousal was associated with higher estimates for 1.1s durations. However, this effect was also found for 3.8s durations. An additional analysis with linear mixed models revealed an interaction between volume manipulation and subjective ratings regarding arousal and pleasure. Based on these results we propose that subjective experience of the emotional quality of stimuli might be interesting for further research on prospective time perception. Moreover, the results showed that not only within subject variation should be statistically controlled when analyzing such data. Instead, statistical models should also include parameters controlling for stimulus material.