The neural bases for timing of durations

Durations are defined by a beginning and an end, and a major distinction is drawn between durations that start in the present and end in the future ('prospective timing') and durations that start in the past and end either in the past or the present ('retrospective timing'). Different psychological processes are thought to be engaged in each of these cases. The former is thought to engage a clock-like mechanism that accurately tracks the continuing passage of time, whereas the latter is thought to engage a reconstructive process that utilizes both temporal and non-temporal information from the memory of past events. We propose that, from a biological perspective, these two forms of duration estimation are supported by computational processes that are both reliant on population state dynamics but are nevertheless distinct. Prospective timing is effectively carried out in a single step where the ongoing dynamics of population activity directly serve as the computation of duration, whereas retrospective timing is carried out in two steps: the initial generation of population state dynamics through the process of event segmentation and the subsequent computation of duration utilizing the memory of those dynamics.