Abstract
Ono and Kawahara (2006) have reported that when the apparent size of a visual object in the Ebbinghaus illusion was overestimated its perceived duration was longer than when its size was underestimated. Because the time estimation task and the size estimation task were presented consecutively in their study, the participants might have estimated the area size during the time estimation task. In the present study the time estimation and size estimation tasks were conducted in separate blocks. This procedure was used to determine whether the effect of apparent visual size on the perceived duration was because the subjective area size was altered by the illusion, or whether it was an artefact caused by the participants engaging in the size estimation task. The results indicated that the perceived duration of apparently large stimuli was longer than that of apparently small stimuli, even if the participants were not engaged in the size estimation task, and revealed that time perception is influenced by subjective area size.
