title: Distortion of time interval reproduction in an epileptic patient with a focal lesion in the right anterior insular/inferior frontal cortices.
abstract: This case report on an epileptic patient suffering from a focal lesion at the junction of the right anterior insular cortex (AIC) and the adjacent inferior frontal cortex (IFC) provides the first evidence that damage to this brain region impairs temporal performance in a visual time reproduction task in which participants had to reproduce the presentation duration (3, 5 and 7s) of emotionally-neutral and -negative pictures. Strikingly, as compared to a group of healthy subjects, the AIC/IFC case considerably overestimated reproduction times despite normal variability. The effect was obtained in all duration and emotion conditions. Such a distortion in time reproduction was not observed in four other epileptic patients without insular or inferior frontal damage. Importantly, the absolute extent of temporal over-reproduction increased in proportion to the magnitude of the target durations, which concurs with the scalar property of interval timing, and points to an impairment of time-specific rather than of non temporal (such as motor) mechanisms. Our data suggest that the disability in temporal reproduction of the AIC/IFC case would result from a distorted memory representation of the encoded duration, occurring during the process of storage and/or of recovery from memory and leading to a deviation of the temporal judgment during the reproduction task. These findings support the recent proposal that the anterior insular/inferior frontal cortices would be involved in time interval representation.
authors.affiliation: University of Lorraine, LCOMS, EA 7306, Rue du Général Delestraint, Metz F-57070, France.
authors.forename: Vincent
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Monfort
authors.affiliation: University of Bordeaux, INCIA, UMR 5287, F-33000 Bordeaux, France. Electronic address: micha.pfeuty@u-bordeaux.fr.
authors.forename: Micha
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Pfeuty
authors.affiliation: University of Lorraine, LCOMS, EA 7306, Rue du Général Delestraint, Metz F-57070, France.
authors.forename: Madelyne
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Klein
authors.affiliation: University of Lorraine, LCOMS, EA 7306, Rue du Général Delestraint, Metz F-57070, France.
authors.forename: Steffie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Collé
authors.affiliation: University Hospital of Nancy, Department of Neurology, 29 avenue du Maréchal-de-Lattre-de-Tassigny, Nancy F-54035, France.
authors.forename: Hélène
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Brissart
authors.affiliation: University Hospital of Nancy, Department of Neurology, 29 avenue du Maréchal-de-Lattre-de-Tassigny, Nancy F-54035, France.
authors.forename: Jacques
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Jonas
authors.affiliation: University Hospital of Nancy, Department of Neurology, 29 avenue du Maréchal-de-Lattre-de-Tassigny, Nancy F-54035, France; Faculté de Médecine de Nancy, Université de Lorraine, France; Université de Lorraine, UMR 7039, CNRS, France.
authors.forename: Louis
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Maillard
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001254:Astrocytoma / Q000150:complications / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000523:psychology*; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology; D001932:Brain Neoplasms / Q000150:complications / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000523:psychology*; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology; D004827:Epilepsy / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000209:etiology / Q000523:psychology*; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D013998:Time Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Anterior insular cortex; Inferior frontal cortex; Temporal processing; Temporal reproduction; Time perception