Resource for temporal information processing in interval production.

The resource required to process temporal information in interval production was investigated. 12 undergraduates performed 4-sec. interval production and nontemporal tasks, the probe digit task and the missing digit task. Although both tasks required memory search and employed the same modality for input and for responding, the probe digit task required a phonological resource and the missing digit task required a spatial resource. Analysis showed that both concurrent nontemporal tasks caused interval productions to be longer, suggesting that the temporal processing required a resource which both tasks used commonly. This resource may be a general purpose, capacity-limited resource associated with a central executive function in working memory.