Prospective timing, attention and the switch - A response to 'Gating or switching? gating is a better model of prospective timing' by Zakay

In response to the 'Switching or gating' paper (Lejeune, H., 1998. Switching or gating? The attentional challenge in cognitive models of psychological time. Behav. Proc. 44, 127-145), Zakay argued that attention allocation to time should reflect attentional processes in general and suggested that the attentional gate model (AGM) has more explanatory power than the temporal information processing model (TIP) of Church (Church, R.M., 1984. Properties of the internal clock. In: Gibbon, J., Allan, L., (Eds.), Timing and Time Perception, vol. 423. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, New York, pp. 566-582). The first point might not be challenged, provided that the specificity of the temporal stimulus is taken into account. Concerning the second point, we argue that the TIP model can account for human prospective timing and discuss differences between attention versus expectancy or motivation. We prefer a 'satellite' attention allocation process, targeting the switch and reference memory (Meck, W.H., 1983. Selective adjustment of the speed of the internal clock and memory processes. J. Exp. Psychol.: Anim. Behav. Proc. 9, 171-201) to an attentional gate serially included in the TIP model of Church.