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Spontaneous Motor Tempo: Investigating Psychological, Chronobiological, and Demographic Factors in a Large-Scale Online Tapping Experiment

The spontaneous motor tempo (SMT) describes the pace of regular and repeated movements such as hand clapping or walking. It is typically measured by letting people tap with their index finger at a pace that feels most natural and comfortable to them. A number of factors have been suggested to influe...

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Autores principales: Hammerschmidt, David, Frieler, Klaus, Wöllner, Clemens
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8262453/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34248776
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.677201
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author Hammerschmidt, David
Frieler, Klaus
Wöllner, Clemens
author_facet Hammerschmidt, David
Frieler, Klaus
Wöllner, Clemens
author_sort Hammerschmidt, David
collection PubMed
description The spontaneous motor tempo (SMT) describes the pace of regular and repeated movements such as hand clapping or walking. It is typically measured by letting people tap with their index finger at a pace that feels most natural and comfortable to them. A number of factors have been suggested to influence the SMT, such as age, time of the day, arousal, and potentially musical experience. This study aimed at investigating the effects of these factors in a combined and out-of-the-lab context by implementing the finger-tapping paradigm in an online experiment using a self-developed web application. Due to statistical multimodality in the distribution of participants' SMT (N = 3,576), showing peaks at modes of around 250 ms, a Gaussian mixture model was applied that grouped participants into six clusters, ranging from Very Fast (M = 265 ms, SD = 74) to Very Slow (M = 1,757 ms, SD = 166). These SMT clusters differed in terms of age, suggesting that older participants had a slower SMT, and time of the day, showing that the earlier it was, the slower participants' SMT. While arousal did not differ between the SMT clusters, more aroused participants showed faster SMTs across all normalized SMT clusters. Effects of musical experience were inconclusive. With a large international sample, these results provide insights into factors influencing the SMT irrespective of cultural background, which can be seen as a window into human timing processes.
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spelling pubmed-82624532021-07-08 Spontaneous Motor Tempo: Investigating Psychological, Chronobiological, and Demographic Factors in a Large-Scale Online Tapping Experiment Hammerschmidt, David Frieler, Klaus Wöllner, Clemens Front Psychol Psychology The spontaneous motor tempo (SMT) describes the pace of regular and repeated movements such as hand clapping or walking. It is typically measured by letting people tap with their index finger at a pace that feels most natural and comfortable to them. A number of factors have been suggested to influence the SMT, such as age, time of the day, arousal, and potentially musical experience. This study aimed at investigating the effects of these factors in a combined and out-of-the-lab context by implementing the finger-tapping paradigm in an online experiment using a self-developed web application. Due to statistical multimodality in the distribution of participants' SMT (N = 3,576), showing peaks at modes of around 250 ms, a Gaussian mixture model was applied that grouped participants into six clusters, ranging from Very Fast (M = 265 ms, SD = 74) to Very Slow (M = 1,757 ms, SD = 166). These SMT clusters differed in terms of age, suggesting that older participants had a slower SMT, and time of the day, showing that the earlier it was, the slower participants' SMT. While arousal did not differ between the SMT clusters, more aroused participants showed faster SMTs across all normalized SMT clusters. Effects of musical experience were inconclusive. With a large international sample, these results provide insights into factors influencing the SMT irrespective of cultural background, which can be seen as a window into human timing processes. Frontiers Media S.A. 2021-06-22 /pmc/articles/PMC8262453/ /pubmed/34248776 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.677201 Text en Copyright © 2021 Hammerschmidt, Frieler and Wöllner. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Psychology
Hammerschmidt, David
Frieler, Klaus
Wöllner, Clemens
Spontaneous Motor Tempo: Investigating Psychological, Chronobiological, and Demographic Factors in a Large-Scale Online Tapping Experiment
title Spontaneous Motor Tempo: Investigating Psychological, Chronobiological, and Demographic Factors in a Large-Scale Online Tapping Experiment
title_full Spontaneous Motor Tempo: Investigating Psychological, Chronobiological, and Demographic Factors in a Large-Scale Online Tapping Experiment
title_fullStr Spontaneous Motor Tempo: Investigating Psychological, Chronobiological, and Demographic Factors in a Large-Scale Online Tapping Experiment
title_full_unstemmed Spontaneous Motor Tempo: Investigating Psychological, Chronobiological, and Demographic Factors in a Large-Scale Online Tapping Experiment
title_short Spontaneous Motor Tempo: Investigating Psychological, Chronobiological, and Demographic Factors in a Large-Scale Online Tapping Experiment
title_sort spontaneous motor tempo: investigating psychological, chronobiological, and demographic factors in a large-scale online tapping experiment
topic Psychology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8262453/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34248776
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.677201
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