How the Physicality of Space Affects How We Think about Time

Time is an abstract concept that is better understood when it is mapped onto space. One mechanism to accomplish this mapping is a reference frame that has a number of parameters that are used to define space, including origin, orientation, direction, and scale. Previous research has shown that the origin (Kolesari & Carlson, 2016) and the orientation and direction (Boroditsky, Fuhrman, & McCormick, 2011) parameters of a spatial reference frame are involved in understanding time. For example, the orientation and direction parameters are used together as a timeline. For English speakers, this timeline runs horizontally from left (past) to right (future). The current experiments focus on the scale parameter. Experiment 1 changes temporal scale across trials, and illustrates that the scale parameter is set, as evidenced by a cost when the parameter value changes. Experiment 2 examines the correspondence between the spatial scale and the temporal scale, requiring participants to map short or long temporal spans to short or long spatial distances. The results illustrate flexibility in this mapping. Together these experiments support the idea that all the parameters of a spatial reference frame are used when understanding time.