Bias towards the future

Greene, Preston; Latham, Andrew James; Miller, Kristie; Norton, James; Tarsney, Christian; Tierney, Hannah

doi:10.1111/phc3.12859

Cited by 6 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 59 publications

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“…This capacity to routinely engage in mental time travel to remember the past and envision the future is well-established (see, e.g., Tulving, 1983;Suddendorf & Corballis, 1997, 2007. Though we engage in both retrospection and prospection, there is evidence indicating an asymmetry in temporal thinking whereby we tend to prioritize thinking about the future more than thinking about the past (Baumeister et al, 2016;Greene et al, 2022).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Does episodic future thinking differ when considering the future of the natural environment? An experimental test

Milfont,

Cuttance-Dunne,

Ellis

2024

Preprint

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The cognitive ability to mental time travel allows people to project themselves backward and forward in time. Research has shown that anticipating and envisioning possible future events, and imagining ourselves experiencing those events, has many implications for health, finance, and environmental protection. While many public policies in these domains consider events that may occur decades ahead in the future, current evidence suggests we typically consider a much shorter temporal distance when spontaneously thinking about the future. Here we examined whether this typical short temporal distance would vary if individuals were primed to think about the future of the natural environment in a between-subjects experiment with online respondents (212 MTurkers). We compared responses from individuals randomly asked to think about the future in general (control condition) to those asked to think about the future of the natural environment (main experimental condition) or the future of the work environment (contrasting experimental condition). Results confirmed that individuals typically think in very short term into the future, with temporal distance between 1 and 5 years. Supporting our intuition, results showed that individuals asked to think about the future of the natural environment were statistically more likely to think longer term (10 years or more) compared to those in the other conditions. We discuss the implications of our findings to time‐scale mismatches in policy making.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Does episodic future thinking differ when considering the future of the natural environment? An experimental test

Milfont,

Cuttance-Dunne,

Ellis

2024

Preprint

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Against a normative asymmetry between near- and future-bias

2023

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Empirical evidence shows that people have multiple time-biases. One is near-bias; another is future-bias. Philosophical theorising about these biases often proceeds on two assumptions. First, that the two biases are independent: that they are explained by different factors (the independence assumption). Second, that there is a normative asymmetry between the two biases: one is rationally impermissible (near-bias) and the other rationally permissible (future-bias). The former assumption at least partly feeds into the latter: if the two biases were not explained by different factors, then it would be less plausible that their normative statuses differ. This paper investigates the independence assumption and finds it unwarranted. In light of this, we argue, there is reason to question the normative asymmetry assumption.

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Exploring Arbitrariness Objections to Time Biases

LATHAM,

MILLER,

et al. 2024

J. of the Am. Philos. Assoc.

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There are two kinds of time bias: near bias and future bias. While philosophers typically hold that near bias is rationally impermissible, many hold that future bias is rationally permissible. Call this normative hybridism. According to arbitrariness objections, certain patterns of preference are rationally impermissible because they are arbitrary. While arbitrariness objections have been leveled against both near bias and future bias, the kind of arbitrariness in question has been different. In this article we investigate whether there are forms of arbitrariness that are common to both kinds of preferences and, hence, whether there are versions of the arbitrariness objection that are objections to both near bias and future bias. If there are, then this might go some way toward undermining normative hybridism and to defending thoroughgoing time-neutralism.

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Bias towards the future

Cited by 6 publications

References 59 publications

Does episodic future thinking differ when considering the future of the natural environment? An experimental test

Does episodic future thinking differ when considering the future of the natural environment? An experimental test

Against a normative asymmetry between near- and future-bias

Exploring Arbitrariness Objections to Time Biases

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