The pursuit of the end: The effects of action-goal choices on temporal binding

Yunyun Chen; Hong He; Xintong Zou; Xuemin Zhang

doi:10.1016/j.concog.2022.103457

The pursuit of the end: The effects of action-goal choices on temporal binding

Conscious Cogn. 2023 Feb:108:103457. doi: 10.1016/j.concog.2022.103457. Epub 2022 Dec 31.

Authors

Yunyun Chen¹, Hong He², Xintong Zou¹, Xuemin Zhang³

Affiliations

¹ Beijing Key Lab of Applied Experimental Psychology, Faculty of Psychology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China.
² Institute of Brain and Psychological Sciences, Sichuan Normal University, Chengdu, China.
³ Beijing Key Lab of Applied Experimental Psychology, Faculty of Psychology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China; State Key Laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience and Learning & IDG/McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China. Electronic address: xmzhang@bnu.edu.cn.

PMID: 36592496
DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2022.103457

Abstract

The effect of action choice (whether one can choose their actions freely) on temporal binding (TB), the temporal contraction between a voluntary action and its effect, is controversial. The present study tried to distinguish action-goal choice (whether one could pursue the action-effect freely) from action choice. Experiments 1 and 2 focused on the effect of action-goal choice on TB while the congruency between actions and outcomes was manipulated (i.e., 50% in Experiment 1 and 80% in Experiment 2). Experiment 3 investigated the effect of action choice on TB when the outcome congruency was 80%. Results showed that free and instructed action-goals led to comparable magnitudes of TB while free actions led to a larger TB than instructed actions. Furthermore, the effect of outcome congruency on TB varied by action-goal choices (Experiment 2) but not action choices (Experiment 3). These results demonstrate the potential differences between action choice and action-goal choice.

Keywords: Action choice; Action-goal choice; Causality; Intention; Temporal binding.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Goals*
Humans
Motivation*
Psychomotor Performance