ArticlePloS one2015
The Developmental Emergence of the Mental Time-Line: Spatial and Numerical Distortion of Time Judgement.
Article in PloS one, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers.
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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.
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Who cites it
13 citing papers in PubMed, 30 citations in OpenAlex.
- Mapping Time Across Spatial Axes: Mental Timeline Development in 3- to 5-Year-Old Mandarin-Speaking Children.Journal of psycholinguistic research · 2026Article
- The effect of aging and emotions on time processing.Aging clinical and experimental research · 2023Article
- How time gets spatial: factors determining the stability and instability of the mental time line.Attention, perception & psychophysics · 2023Article
- An Illusory Motion in Stationary Stimuli Alters Their Perceived Duration.Vision (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- Time reproduction, bisection and doubling: a novel paradigm to investigate the effect of the internal clock on time estimation.Psychological research · 2023Article
- The effect of magnitude in a simultaneous duration assessment task among children - a replication study.PloS one · 2023Article
- Where Are the Months? Mental Images of Circular Time in a Large Online Sample.Frontiers in psychology · 2019Article
- Rightward and leftward biases in temporal reproduction of objects represented in central and peripheral spaces.Neurobiology of learning and memory · 2018Article
- Article
- A Mental Timeline for Duration From the Age of 5 Years Old.Frontiers in psychology · 2018Article
- Innate and Cultural Spatial Time: A Developmental Perspective.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2017Review
- Possible evolutionary and developmental mechanisms of mental time travel (and implications for autism).Current opinion in behavioral sciences · 2016Article
- Isochronous Sequential Presentation Helps Children Orient Their Attention in Time.Frontiers in psychology · 2016Article
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Authors and funding
2 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The perception of time is susceptible to distortion by factors such as attention, emotion, or even the physical properties of the stimulus to be timed. In adults, there is now evidence for a left-right spatial representation of time or "mental time-line", in which short durations map to the left side of space, whereas long durations map to the right. We investigated the developmental trajectory of the mental time-line, by examining how spatial and numerical stimulus properties affect temporal bisection judgements in 3 groups of children (5, 8 or 10 year olds), as well as in adults. In contrast to previous developmental studies of the spatial representation of time, we manipulated spatial position (left-right) rather than spatial magnitude (distance) so as to pinpoint the age at which the mental time-line begins to influence the judgement of time. In addition, we manipulated spatial position symbolically, either directly, using left- or right-pointing arrows, or indirectly, using low (1) or high (9) digits. In adults and older children (10 year olds), the rightward arrow and the higher digit were judged to last longer. However, time judgements were unaffected by arrow direction and digits in the younger children. Therefore, the temporal distortions induced by symbolic representations of space (arrows) or number (digits) emerged with development, suggesting that the mental time-line is not derived from a primitive spatial representation of time but, rather, is the fruit of learning and is acquired around the age of 8-10 years old.
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