Dr Derek Arnold, School of Psychology

Dr Derek Arnold

Scientific experiments by a UQ researcher have shown that our own brain activity can influence our sense of timing.

Work by Dr Derek Arnold, of the UQ School of Psychology, goes against a widely held belief that activity in the cortex of the human brain does not influence how we perceive time.

Dr Arnold has been awarded a $60,000 UQ Foundation Research Excellence Award.

His project will build on his recent work and have substantial implications for understanding the mechanisms involved in time perception.

“Clarifying the mechanisms involved in normal time perception will obviously help in understanding situations where those mechanisms fail,” he said.

“So, in addition to the considerable theoretical significance, this project may have implications for our understanding of disorders associated with impaired time perception, such as autism, dyslexia and schizophrenia.”

His recent work has examined sensory changes that can only be detected because of activity in the cortex of the human brain.

He has found that large changes can be detected more rapidly than smaller changes. He also found that large changes seemed to occur earlier than smaller changes.

Dr Arnold, who was awarded his PhD in the field of visual perception by Macquarie University in Sydney in 2003, worked at University College London before joining UQ 18 months ago. He said he was attracted to UQ by the exciting opportunity to work with internationally recognised sensory neuroscience researchers, particularly in the School of Psychology and at the Queensland Brain Institute (QBI).

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