Best wishes for the future: The link between dispositional optimism and mental sagittal space-time mappings

Li, Heng; Cao, Yu

doi:10.1016/j.paid.2020.110212

Cited by 8 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…Thus, individual attitudes towards time could be conditioned by personal experiences and differences. Previous literature (Bylund et al, 2020;Li & Cao, 2017b, 2018a, 2020a has shown that people's temporal focus may vary according to individual differences originating from psychological attitudes, personality traits (e.g. optimism), age, and personal experiences, such as religious beliefs and living environments.…”

Section: The Temporal Focus Hypothesis and Individual Variationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These questionnaires measured individual differences in dispositional optimism and multiple aspects of personality, respectively. The results revealed that people with optimistic attitudes and high levels of conscientiousness (the Big Five aspect that was investigated in relation to temporal focus) were more likely to be inspired by an upcoming future and displayed future temporal focus that correlated with future-in-front mappings (Li & Cao, 2019, 2020a.…”

Section: The Temporal Focus Hypothesis and Individual Variationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Personality traits also affect attitudes towards time. In order to measure personality traits, Li and Cao (2019, 2020a) required participants to take a questionnaire on the Life Orientation Test – Revised (Scheier et al., 1994) or the Big Five Inventory (John et al., 1991) after they finished the TDT. These questionnaires measured individual differences in dispositional optimism and multiple aspects of personality, respectively.…”

Section: Background Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

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The Effect of COVID‐Related Quarantine and Attitudes on Time Conceptualization: Evidence From Temporal Focus and Implicit Space‐Time Mappings

Athanasopoulos,

2024

Language Learning

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The temporal focus hypothesis (TFH) entails that individuals who value the past tend to conceptualize it in front, whereas individuals who value the future tend to map the future in front instead (de la Fuente et al., 2014). This varies as a function of culture, individual differences, and context. Here, we extend this line of inquiry by testing a contextual variable, namely COVID‐19 quarantine status, and an individual differences variable, namely future precautionary behavior towards COVID‐19. Contrary to what the TFH would predict, we show that participants map the future to a frontal position, regardless of individual attitudes and quarantine status. However, participants who displayed more future precautionary behavior were also more future‐focused than participants who displayed less such behaviour, but this did not predict their front–back mappings of the future. These findings suggest that individual differences may be stronger determinants of temporal focus than contextual variables.

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Section: The Temporal Focus Hypothesis and Individual Variationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Temporal Focus Hypothesis and Individual Variationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Background Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

The Effect of COVID‐Related Quarantine and Attitudes on Time Conceptualization: Evidence From Temporal Focus and Implicit Space‐Time Mappings

Athanasopoulos,

2024

Language Learning

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“…Attentional patterns can become habits and there is evidence that individuals differ in their predominant temporal focus. Future-focused people tend to be younger (de la Fuente et al, 2014), more conscientious (Li & Cao, 2017), liberal (Lammers & Baldwin, 2018;Li & Cao, 2020a), optimistic (Li & Cao, 2020b), organizational, proactive, efficient, open to change (Kruglanski, Pierro, & Higgins, 2015;Shipp & Aeon, 2019;Shipp, Edwards, & Lambert, 2009), and anxious (Eysenck, Payne, & Santos, 2006;Rinaldi et al, 2017) than past-focused people. Culture can also modulate temporal focus (Callizo-Romero et al, 2020;de la Fuente et al, 2014;Li, VanBui, & Cao, 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Does time extend asymmetrically into the past and the future? A multitask crosscultural study

et al. 2022

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Does temporal thought extend asymmetrically into the past and the future? Do asymmetries depend on cultural differences in temporal focus? Some studies suggest that people in Western (arguably future-focused) cultures perceive the future as being closer, more valued, and deeper than the past (a future asymmetry), while the opposite is shown in East Asian (arguably past-focused) cultures. The proposed explanations of these findings predict a negative relationship between past and future: the more we delve into the future, the less we delve into the past. Here, we report findings that pose a significant challenge to this view. We presented several tasks previously used to measure temporal asymmetry (self-continuity, time discounting, temporal distance, and temporal depth) and two measures of temporal focus to American, Spanish, Serbian, Bosniak, Croatian, Moroccan, Turkish, and Chinese participants (total N = 1,075). There was an overall future asymmetry in all tasks except for temporal distance, but the asymmetry only varied with cultural temporal focus in time discounting. Past and future held a positive (instead of negative) relation in the mind: the more we delve into the future, the more we delve into the past. Finally, the findings suggest that temporal thought has a complex underlying structure.

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“…Furthermore, a wide range of sociological, contextual, and personality factors play a variety of roles in how people mentally represent temporal focus and thus their space-time mappings ( Li and Cao, 2019 , Li and Cao, 2020a ). For instance, reasoning that conservatives, who place a value on tradition, are characterized by their past-focused thinking, while liberals, who favor change, are characterized by their future-focused thinking, Li and Cao (2020b) predicted that conservatives and liberals would be more likely to think about time adhered to the past-in-front pattern and to the future-in-front pattern, respectively.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Best wishes for the future: The link between dispositional optimism and mental sagittal space-time mappings

Cited by 8 publications

References 38 publications

The Effect of COVID‐Related Quarantine and Attitudes on Time Conceptualization: Evidence From Temporal Focus and Implicit Space‐Time Mappings

The Effect of COVID‐Related Quarantine and Attitudes on Time Conceptualization: Evidence From Temporal Focus and Implicit Space‐Time Mappings

Does time extend asymmetrically into the past and the future? A multitask crosscultural study

In times of illness: Covid-19 threat influences temporal focus and implicit space-time mappings

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