RESEARCH ARTICLE Timing movements to interval durations speciﬁed by discrete or continuous sounds Matthew W. M. Rodger • Cathy M. Craig Received: 9 March 2011 / Accepted: 6 August 2011 / Published online: 20 August 2011 Ó Springer-Verlag 2011 Abstract Understanding how the timing of motor output is coupled to sensory temporal information is largely based on synchronisation of movements through small motion gaps (ﬁnger taps) to mostly empty sensory intervals (dis- crete beats). This study investigated synchronisation of movements between target barriers over larger motion gaps when closing time gaps of intervals were presented as either continuous, dynamic sounds, or discrete beats. Results showed that although synchronisation errors were smaller for discrete sounds, the variability of errors was lower for continuous sounds. Furthermore, ﬁnger move- ment between targets was found to be more sinusoidal when continuous sensory information was presented during intervals compared to discrete. When movements were made over larger amplitudes, synchronisation errors tended to be more positive and movements between barriers more sinusoidal, than for movements over shorter amplitudes. These results show that the temporal control of movement is not independent from the form of the sensory informa- tion that speciﬁes time gaps or the magnitude of the movement required for synchronisation. Keywords Sensorimotor synchronisation  Temporal control of movement  Time perception  Continuous sounds Introduction Synchronisation of movements with temporal intervals speciﬁed by sensory information is a basic and important human skill. Sensorimotor synchronisation can occur spontaneously, as when people fall into simultaneous gait cadences (Nessler and Gilliland 2009) or when audience applause tends towards a common rhythm (Neda et al. 2000). It may also be the result of many hours of deliberate practice to achieve an artistic or athletic performance, as is the case for ensemble musicians (Maduell and Wing 2007) or for rowing (Hill 2002). At a more fundamental level, sensorimotor synchronisation can provide a window through which to view the workings and limitations of coupling between time in the nervous system and time in the external world. The majority of studies that examine sensorimotor synchronisation have focussed on tapping a ﬁnger to an auditory beat (Aschersleben 2002; Doumas and Wing 2007; Repp 2005; Wing and Kristofferson 1973). Accor- dingly, timing movement to sensory information has been understood from a scenario involving a relatively small movement scale, in response to temporal information speciﬁed by discrete, mostly empty intervals. However, this paradigm is not informative about timing of move- ments when there is continuous, dynamic sensory infor- mation available to prospectively guide actions, for example, when two dancers visually follow the gestures of each other. Moreover, it is not a given that temporal control of small-scale movements will be isomorphic with that of movements made over larger scales. In order to expand the understanding of movement timing, it will ﬁrst be useful to describe this type of task using a general framework for actions: Lee’s theory of temporal control of movement, which characterises any action as the closure of a motion M. W. M. Rodger (&)  C. M. Craig School of Psychology, Queen’s University Belfast, David Keir Building, 18-30 Malone Road, Belfast BT9 5BN, UK e-mail: m.rodger@qub.ac.uk 123 Exp Brain Res (2011) 214:393–402 DOI 10.1007/s00221-011-2837-2