ArticleFrontiers in psychology2018
Placing Abstract Concepts in Space: Quantity, Time and Emotional Valence.
Article in Frontiers in psychology, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers.
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Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed.
- 2D mental whiteboards: Multidimensional spatial coding of serial order in verbal working memory.Psychological research · 2026Article
- Does the Level of Temporal Demand Affect Activation of the Mental Timeline?Journal of cognition · 2025Article
- Vertical Mental Timeline Is Not Influenced by VisuoSpatial Processing.Brain sciences · 2024Article
- The combination of the horizontal and vertical dimensions in mental time representation: the existence of a spatial mental map of time.Attention, perception & psychophysics · 2023Article
- A pilot study of how the past, present, and future are represented in three-dimensional space.Frontiers in psychology · 2023Article
- Consensus Paper: Current Perspectives on Abstract Concepts and Future Research Directions.Journal of cognition · 2023Article
- Low numbers from a low head? Effects of observed head orientation on numerical cognition.Psychological research · 2020Article
- Metaphor and the Philosophical Implications of Embodied Mathematics.Frontiers in psychology · 2020Article
- Why Smoggy Days Suppress Our Mood: Automatic Association Between Clarity and Valence.Frontiers in psychology · 2019Article
- Vertical Head Movements Influence Memory Performance for Words With Emotional Content.Frontiers in psychology · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Research has shown that abstract concepts are often conceptualized along horizontal and vertical axes. However, there are mixed results concerning which axis is preferred for which type of conceptual domain. For instance, it has been suggested that the vertical axis may be preferred for quantity in tasks using linguistic stimuli (e.g., 'more,' 'less'), whereas numerals (e.g., '1,' '2,' '3') may be more prone to horizontal conceptualization. In this study, we used a task with free response options to see where participants would place quantity words ('most,' 'more,' 'less,' 'least'), numerals ('2,' '4,' '7,' '9'), time words ('past,' 'future,' 'earliest,' 'earlier,' 'later,' 'latest') and emotional valence words ('best,' 'better,' 'worse,' 'worst'). We find that for quantity words, the vertical axis was preferred; whereas for numerals, participants preferred the horizontal axis. For time concepts, participants preferred the horizontal axis; and for emotional valence, they preferred the vertical axis. Across all tasks, participants tended to use specific axes (horizontal, vertical), rather than combining these two axes in diagonal responses. These results shed light on the spatial nature of abstract thought.
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Registered trials
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.