Humans form associations between time intervals and subsequent events and thus develop time-based expectancies that enable time-based action preparation. For instance, when each of two foreperiods (short vs. long) is frequently paired with one specific task (e.g., number magnitude judgment vs. number parity judgment) and infrequently with the alternative task, participants are faster to respond to frequent rather than infrequent foreperiod-task combinations. Here, we investigated the time course of time-based task expectancy by measuring eye movements toward a left and right target location. Foreperiods predicted target locations with 100% validity and tasks with 90% validity. In 2 experiments, without having any explicit knowledge about the foreperiod-location or foreperiod-task contingencies, participants first moved their eyes to the location associated with the short foreperiod and then looked toward the location of the long foreperiod (if no stimulus had been presented after the short foreperiod had passed). That is, they proactively moved their eyes to optimize perception in line with the specific time and location they expected an event to occur at. Importantly, these eye movements reflected not only time-based location expectations, but also time-based task expectations. We discuss new insights in time-based expectancy and its temporal dynamics obtained from anticipatory eye movements and highlight spontaneous eye movements as a window into cognitive processes that cannot be assessed via behavioral response measures. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

中文翻译：

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只有时间会告诉未来：预期的眼跳揭示了基于时间的位置和任务预期的时间动态。

人类在时间间隔和后续事件之间形成关联，从而制定基于时间的预期，从而实现基于时间的行动准备。例如，当两个前期（短与长）中的每一个都经常与一项特定任务（例如，数字大小判断与数字奇偶判断）配对并且很少与替代任务配对时，参与者对频繁而不是不频繁的反应更快前期任务组合。在这里，我们通过测量朝向左右目标位置的眼球运动来研究基于时间的任务预期的时间过程。Foreperiods 预测目标位置的有效性为 100%，任务的有效性为 90%。在 2 个实验中，在没有任何关于前期位置或前期任务突发事件的明确知识的情况下，参与者首先将眼睛移到与短前经相关的位置，然后看向长前经的位置（如果在短前经过后没有出现刺激）。也就是说，他们主动移动眼睛以根据他们预期事件发生的特定时间和地点来优化感知。重要的是，这些眼球运动不仅反映了基于时间的位置期望，还反映了基于时间的任务期望。我们讨论了基于时间的预期及其从预期眼动中获得的时间动态的新见解，并强调自发眼动是进入认知过程的窗口，无法通过行为反应措施进行评估。（PsycInfo 数据库记录 (c) 2020 APA，保留所有权利）。