Revista de Psicología
October 30, 2026
Sylvie Droit-Volet
The conference Why Do You Say That Time Passes Faster or Slower?, delivered by Dr. Sylvie Droit-Volet, addressed the psychological and cognitive mechanisms involved in the subjective perception of the passage of time, with particular emphasis on the influence of emotions, attention, memory, and bodily states. The conference focused on the distinction between judgments of the passage of time and...
Consciousness and Cognition
August 5, 2026
Sylvie Droit-Volet, F. Monier, Natalia Martinelli
The question raised in this study was: when and why does the feeling of a change in the passage of time arise? Participants were instructed to press a button as soon as they perceived a change in the speed of the passage of time. After each detection, they indicated whether they felt that time was "speeding up" and "slowing down", and rated the intensity of this feeling. They also rated their...
Current Topics in Behavioral Neurosciences
2025
Marc Wittmann, Sylvie Droit-Volet
In accordance with Bud (A.D.) Craig's theories, we maintain that ascending physiological signals in their temporal dynamics are a necessary prerequisite for human time judgments. Functional neuroimaging and psychophysiological evidence have increasingly demonstrated that the subjective judgment of time is based on the physical and emotional self. The psychological literature reveals how...
Frontiers in Psychology
2023
Natalia Martinelli, Sylvie Droit-Volet
This study examined the relationships between the awareness of the speed of the passage of time, the judgment of durations and experiential factors in children aged 4-9 years. They were asked to judge the duration and the speed of the passage of time for different intervals (second and minutes), and to rate their feelings (arousal, happiness, sadness, and task difficulty) during each interval....
PeerJ
2020
Sylvie Droit-Volet, Sophie Monceau, Michael Dambrun et al.
17 citations
Using an out-of-body paradigm, the present study provided further empirical evidence for the theory of embodied time by suggesting that the body-self plays a key role in time judgments. Looking through virtual reality glasses, the participants saw the arm of a mannequin instead of their own arm. They had to judge the duration of the interval between two (perceived) touches applied to the...
PLoS One
October 18, 2019
Sylvie Droit-Volet, Magali Chaulet, Frédéric Dutheil et al.
22 citations
This manuscript presents two studies on the effect of mindfulness meditation on duration judgment and its relationship to the subjective experience of time when the interval durations are on the second or the minute time scale. After the first 15 minutes of a 30-min meditation or control exercise, meditation-trained participants judged interval durations of 15 to 50 s or 2 to 6 min, during...
PsyCh Journal
March 1, 2019
Sylvie Droit-Volet, Michael Dambrun
72 citations
What do humans mean when they say that time passes quickly or slowly? In this article, we try to respond to this question on the basis of our studies on the judgment of the passage of time and its links with the judgment of physical durations. The awareness of the passage of time when consciousness is altered by meditation is also discussed. A dissociation is then made among the "self-time...