Liam Jordan

Thesis Title: Using individual differences to investigate the socially relevant components oftime perception

Human social interaction depends heavily on the ability to interpret the timing of others’ behaviour. Variations in when someone looks towards us, how long eye contact is maintained, or when gaze is withdrawn can alter social meaning. Despite its importance, the mechanisms supporting socially relevant time perception remain poorly understood. Traditional models typically assume an internal clock, whereas recent accounts propose multiple, specialised timing mechanisms, flexibly recruited as tasks demand. This project investigates the structure of human timing by focusing on social gaze as an informative test case.

Rather than treating between-participant variability as noise, the project adopts an individual differences approach to examine patterns of covariation across timing tasks. Participants will complete a battery of visual and oculomotor paradigms, including both social and neutral intervals. Data will be collected using a combination of high-precision online testing and laboratory-based eyetracking, including pupillometry as an index of arousal. Individual traits linked to social functioning will also be assessed.

Analytically, the project will employ reliability analysis, multivariate covariance modelling, and factor analytic techniques to determine whether performance is best explained by a single general timing factor or by multiple partially independent components. Where appropriate, computational models will be used to generate predicted covariance structures under competing theoretical accounts.

By integrating social perception, time perception, and individual differences, this research aims to determine whether social timing relies on general-purpose temporal mechanisms or on additional social content channels, informing broader theories of temporal cognition and social interaction.

Methodologies:

Quantitative research, behavioural experiments, psychophysics, eye-tracking, pupillometry, online experimentation, individual differences analysis, factor analysis, latent variable modelling, multivariate statistics, computational modelling, gaze perception paradigms, visual timing tasks

Biography:

I am a PhD researcher in the School of Psychology and Vision Sciences at the University of Leicester. My research focuses on human time perception, with particular emphasis on how temporal processing supports social interaction. I am especially interested in how people perceive and interpret the timing of socially meaningful events, such as eye contact and gaze behaviour, and how small variations in timing can alter social meaning.

My doctoral work adopts an individual differences approach, treating variability between individuals as a valuable source of theoretical insight rather than statistical noise. Using a combination of behavioural experiments, eye-tracking, and pupillometry, alongside advanced multivariate and latent-variable modelling, I aim to examine whether time perception is best characterised by a single general mechanism or by multiple partially specialised timing channels. A central aim of my research is to understand how general timing processes interact with social content, arousal, and individual traits.

My broader interests lie in bridging perceptual theory with socially relevant behaviour, and in developing rigorous, data-driven methods for testing competing models of temporal cognition. Through this work, I hope to contribute to a more precise understanding of how timing mechanisms operate across individuals and contexts, particularly in situations that are critical for everyday social interaction.

Publication:

Jordan, L., Alcalá, J. A., Urcelay, G. P., & Prados, J. (2023). Conditioned place avoidance in the planaria Schmidtea mediterranea: A pre-clinical invertebrate model of anxiety-related disorders. Behavioural Processes, 210, 104894. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.beproc.2023.104894.

Membership:

The Applied Vision Association (AVA)

School of Psychology and Vision Sciences, University of Leicester

2025 Cohort

Email:

Personal Website: www.liamjordan.co.ukLink opens in a new window

Supervisory Team:

Aurelio Bruno

Niel Roach

Richard Leadbeater