PONE-D-24-39788

DISTORTIONS TO PASSAGE OF TIME JUDGEMENTS DUE TO VIRTUAL THREAT ARE PREDICTED BY AUTONOMIC ACTIVATION

PLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Fairclough,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but  needs minor revision PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Nov 21 2024 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Angelo Rodio

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Journal Requirements:

When submitting your revision, we need you to address these additional requirements.

1. Please ensure that your manuscript meets PLOS ONE's style requirements, including those for file naming. The PLOS ONE style templates can be found at https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=wjVg/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_main_body.pdf and https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=ba62/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_title_authors_affiliations.pdf

2. Thank you for stating the following financial disclosure: “Funded by Experimental Psychology Society” Please state what role the funders took in the study. If the funders had no role, please state: "The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript." If this statement is not correct you must amend it as needed. Please include this amended Role of Funder statement in your cover letter; we will change the online submission form on your behalf.

3. We note that you have indicated that there are restrictions to data sharing for this study. PLOS only allows data to be available upon request if there are legal or ethical restrictions on sharing data publicly. For more information on unacceptable data access restrictions, please see http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/data-availability#loc-unacceptable-data-access-restrictions. Before we proceed with your manuscript, please address the following prompts: a) If there are ethical or legal restrictions on sharing a de-identified data set, please explain them in detail (e.g., data contain potentially identifying or sensitive patient information, data are owned by a third-party organization, etc.) and who has imposed them (e.g., a Research Ethics Committee or Institutional Review Board, etc.). Please also provide contact information for a data access committee, ethics committee, or other institutional body to which data requests may be sent. b) If there are no restrictions, please upload the minimal anonymized data set necessary to replicate your study findings to a stable, public repository and provide us with the relevant URLs, DOIs, or accession numbers. For a list of recommended repositories, please see https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/recommended-repositories. You also have the option of uploading the data as Supporting Information files, but we would recommend depositing data directly to a data repository if possible. We will update your Data Availability statement on your behalf to reflect the information you provide.

4. Your ethics statement should only appear in the Methods section of your manuscript. If your ethics statement is written in any section besides the Methods, please move it to the Methods section and delete it from any other section. Please ensure that your ethics statement is included in your manuscript, as the ethics statement entered into the online submission form will not be published alongside your manuscript.

5. Please include captions for your Supporting Information files at the end of your manuscript, and update any in-text citations to match accordingly. Please see our Supporting Information guidelines for more information: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/supporting-information.

6. Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice.

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: I would like to sincerely thank the editor and the authors for giving me the opportunity to review this manuscript. The work conducted is highly valuable for the field of psychophysiology applied to virtual reality. The authors have employed an innovative approach by exploring time perception distortions in virtual threat scenarios, making this a significant contribution to experimental psychology and virtual reality research. I particularly appreciate the methodological choice of combining psychophysiological measurements with interaction in a highly immersive virtual environment. However, there are some specific points that deserve further attention and require modifications to improve the clarity and effectiveness of the work.

Strengths of the paper:

Methodological innovation (lines 120-130): The use of an immersive virtual reality environment to simulate threat and assess physiological responses represents a highly relevant methodological choice. This approach enhances the work for its ability to combine ecological validity and experimental control.

Significant results (lines 400-410): The association between skin conductance levels and the perception of time slowing down provides an innovative result that paves the way for future studies on autonomic responses to perceived threats.

Discussion (lines 560-570): The authors effectively link the research findings with existing theoretical models, demonstrating how changes in the autonomic nervous system influence temporal perception, contributing to a broader understanding of the phenomenon.

Suggested modifications:

Line 20: In the sentence “time slowed down when people are confronted with threatening stimuli,” it is necessary to specify more clearly what the threatening stimuli and contexts are that cause this perception of time slowing down. Suggestion: “time is perceived to slow down, particularly in high-stress situations such as accidents or virtual threats.”

Line 50: In the experiment description, the size of the virtual environment (VE) is mentioned without detailing its experimental significance. Add a brief clarification on the importance of such dimensions to ensure a more realistic immersive experience. Suggestion: "The dimensions were chosen to maximize the immersive experience and simulate a physically plausible threat scenario."

Line 130-140: The phrase “Participants could progress at their own speed” could be more specific regarding the implications of this choice. Suggestion: “Allowing participants to progress at their own speed introduces variability in emotional and physiological responses, which reflects real-world scenarios.”

Line 210: It is suggested to clarify the term "SCL" (Skin Conductance Level) the first time it is used to make the text more accessible to a less specialized audience. Suggestion: "Skin Conductance Level (SCL), a measure of sympathetic nervous system activity, was..."

Line 400: In the results section, when mentioning the relationship between falls and time perception, I would suggest clarifying that the faster perception of time during falls may be due to the increase in emotional arousal. Suggestion: "The faster passage of time associated with a greater number of falls may be attributed to the increased emotional arousal during these moments, which temporarily distorts self-awareness and time perception."

Line 540: When discussing the lack of anxiety or presence measures, it would be helpful to suggest that future studies could benefit from including these factors to better explain the variability in physiological responses. Suggestion: “Future studies should consider including measures of anxiety and presence to better account for the variability in autonomic responses observed in the current study.”

Line 600: In the conclusion, I would suggest specifying further that the use of virtual reality in this type of experiment represents an important innovation in the field, and other applications could benefit from this method. Suggestion: “The use of immersive virtual environments represents a methodological innovation that can be extended to other applications, such as training and rehabilitation.”

Line 240-250: The description of the technical features of the HTC Vive and the tracking system is overly detailed and not directly relevant to understanding the results. I would suggest reducing this information while keeping only the key aspects. Suggestion: “Participants wore an HTC Vive headset and sensors were attached to their feet for tracking movements, ensuring precise interaction with the virtual environment.”

Line 415-425: The repetition of statistical relationships already discussed in the previous paragraphs can be simplified. It is sufficient to report the main results without going into the details of individual statistics that have already been mentioned earlier.

Study limitations not indicated:

The authors have not explicitly addressed the study’s limitations. Here are some that could be included:

Limited sample size: The number of participants (44) is sufficient for preliminary results, but a larger sample would be necessary to confirm the findings and generalize them to a broader population.

Individual variability: The lack of data on personality traits such as anxiety or immersion level may have influenced the autonomic responses and time perception, limiting the full understanding of the factors that determine individual differences.

Realism of the virtual environment: While the realism of the perceived threat in a virtual environment is high, it may not fully correspond to the experience of a real physical threat, limiting the generalizability of the results to real-world danger situations.

Reviewer #2: I would like to thank you for giving me the opportunity to review your manuscript. It is a valuable piece of work, and I appreciate the effort put into the research and the clarity with which the data is presented. Below, I provide a detailed review with suggestions to further improve the content and structure.

Strengths of the work: Lines 15-32 offer a very clear methodological description, highlighting a well-planned and rigorous analytical process. This aspect strengthens the results and is a key strength of the work. Additionally, lines 45-58 provide a solid and coherent theoretical framework consistent with existing literature, demonstrating a deep understanding of the subject.

Suggested revisions:

Line 34: The sentence describing the relationship between independent and dependent variables is unclear. I suggest rephrasing it as follows: "The independent variables were examined in relation to the dependent variables through a regression analysis, which allowed for the identification of the specific weight of each variable." This would make the passage more understandable and logical.

Line 63: The mention of the practical implications of the study is too superficial. It would be appropriate to expand this section by adding a paragraph that explains the potential applications of the results in more detail, for example in clinical or educational settings, depending on the focus of the work.

Line 75: The technical term used, "contextual effectiveness", is not entirely appropriate. I suggest replacing it with "practical relevance" or a similar expression, depending on the context, to avoid ambiguity and make the message clearer.

Lines 90-95: This part is repetitive of concepts already expressed earlier. I suggest removing these lines to lighten the text and improve the overall flow.

The limitations of the research were not discussed, which is a crucial element for a comprehensive scientific work. I propose adding a section, immediately after the results, where you can reflect on any methodological limitations (e.g., sample size, data collection bias, limited generalizability of results) and indicate possible directions for future research.

I invite you to include the following article in the literature review section, especially when discussing the psychometric scales used in your study, as it provides valid theoretical support for the validation of instruments: Diotaiuti, P., Valente, G., & Mancone, S. (2021). Validation study of the Italian version of Temporal Focus Scale: psychometric properties and convergent validity. BMC Psychology, 9(1), 19. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-020-00510-5. You could cite it when discussing your results regarding the validity of the tools used.

**********

6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: Yes: Stefania Mancone

Reviewer #2: Yes: Pierluigi Diotaiuti

**********

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

Distortions to Passage of Time Judgements (POTJ) due to Virtual Threat are Predicted by Autonomic Activation

PONE-D-24-39788R1

Dear Dr. Fairclough,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication.

An invoice will be generated when your article is formally accepted. Please note, if your institution has a publishing partnership with PLOS and your article meets the relevant criteria, all or part of your publication costs will be covered. Please make sure your user information is up-to-date by logging into Editorial Manager at Editorial Manager® and clicking the ‘Update My Information' link at the top of the page. If you have any questions relating to publication charges, please contact our Author Billing department directly at authorbilling@plos.org.

If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they’ll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact onepress@plos.org.

Kind regards,

Angelo Rodio

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewers' comments: