Evidence map›Paper›PMID 24109147›Full record

ArticleAnimal behaviour2013

Metabolic rate and body size are linked with perception of temporal information.

Kevin Healy, Luke McNally, Graeme D Ruxton, Natalie Cooper, Andrew L Jackson

Open access · hybridAbstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Animal behaviour, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 51 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
51citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
44.6field-weighted citation impact, top 1% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

51 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 195 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Pooled it
  2. Article
  3. Article
  4. Article
  5. Critical flicker fusion frequency: confounders and caveats.European journal of applied physiology · 2026
    Article
  6. Article
  7. One Biology and the Status of Humans.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2025
    Review
  8. Article
  9. Article
  10. Article
  11. Article
  12. A Review of Cervidae Visual Ecology.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2024
    Review
  13. Article
  14. Article
  15. Article
  16. Article
  17. Physiological properties of the visual system in the Green Weaver ant, Oecophylla smaragdina.Journal of comparative physiology. A, Neuroethology, sensory, neural, and behavioral physiology · 2023
    Article
  18. Review
  19. Defining Short-Term Accommodation for Animals.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2023
    Article
  20. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.

Kevin HealyDepartment of Zoology, School of Natural Sciences, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland ; Trinity Centre for Biodiversity Research, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland.
Luke McNally
Graeme D Ruxton
Natalie Cooper
Andrew L Jackson
Trinity College Dublin · IEUniversity of St Andrews · GB

Funding

Wellcome Trust 095831
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Body size and metabolic rate both fundamentally constrain how species interact with their environment, and hence ultimately affect their niche. While many mechanisms leading to these constraints have been explored, their effects on the resolution at which temporal information is perceived have been largely overlooked. The visual system acts as a gateway to the dynamic environment and the relative resolution at which organisms are able to acquire and process visual information is likely to restrict their ability to interact with events around them. As both smaller size and higher metabolic rates should facilitate rapid behavioural responses, we hypothesized that these traits would favour perception of temporal change over finer timescales. Using critical flicker fusion frequency, the lowest frequency of flashing at which a flickering light source is perceived as constant, as a measure of the maximum rate of temporal information processing in the visual system, we carried out a phylogenetic comparative analysis of a wide range of vertebrates that supported this hypothesis. Our results have implications for the evolution of signalling systems and predator-prey interactions, and, combined with the strong influence that both body mass and metabolism have on a species' ecological niche, suggest that time perception may constitute an important and overlooked dimension of niche differentiation.

Indexed as

comparative analysiscritical flicker fusionevolutionary ecologypredator–preytemporal resolution

Identifiers

PMID24109147
PMCPMC3791410
OpenAlexW2144141797

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.