The functional maturation of timing functions is relatively understudied, despite consistent evidence for relatively late maturation of these functions [9, 11, 57] and the fact that they are essential for other late developing executive functions such as planning (temporal foresight), speech (time discrimination) and mature time management (motor timing and time estimation) [13, 14]. Timing functions are typically subcategorized into (1) motor timing, measured in tasks that require the adjustment of a motor response to externally given temporal intervals, typically of milliseconds or seconds; (2) time perception, measured in tasks requiring to estimate, (re)produce or discriminate between temporal intervals between milliseconds to minutes; and (3) temporal foresight, testing forward thinking and the future consideration of current behaviour, measured in temporal discounting or inter-temporal choice tasks of typically longer interval ranges of weeks to years. They require inter-temporal bridging of relatively long temporal distances and are important for decision-making, future planning or inter-temporal choice behaviour.
