Thinking in and about time: A dual systems perspective on temporal cognition

Abstract

We outline a dual systems approach to temporal cognition, which distinguishes between two cognitive systems for dealing with how things unfold over time – a temporal updating system and a temporal reasoning system – of which the former is both phylogenetically and ontogenetically more primitive than the latter, and which are at work alongside each other in adult human cognition. We describe the main features of each of the two systems, the types of behavior the more primitive temporal updating system can support, and the respects in which it is more limited than the temporal reasoning system. We then use the distinction between the two systems to interpret findings in comparative and developmental psychology, arguing that animals operate only with a temporal updating system and that children start out doing so too, before gradually becoming capable of thinking and reasoning about time. After this, we turn to adult human cognition and suggest that our account can also shed light on a specific feature of humans’ everyday thinking about time that has been the subject of debate in the philosophy of time, which consists in a tendency to think about the nature of time itself in a way that appears ultimately self-contradictory. We conclude by considering the topic of intertemporal choice, and argue that drawing the distinction between temporal updating and temporal reasoning is also useful in the context of characterizing two distinct mechanisms for delaying gratification.

Pain in the Past and Pleasure in the Future: The Development of Past–Future Preferences for Hedonic Goods

“…Preschoolers are still learning to reason about the causal significance of whether an event is in the past or the future (Grant & Suddendorf, 2010;Zhang & Hudson, 2018) and getting to grips with locating and ordering events in time (Friedman, 1989(Friedman, , 2005Hoerl & McCormack, 2019). Thus, the pattern of performance observed in this age group may reflect a genuine difference in the significance preschoolers attach to an experience being in the past versus the future.…”

“…Preschool children use tensed language appropriately (Harner, 1976;Weist, Wysocka, & Lyytinen, 1991) and are able to episodically remember the past and imagine the future (Coughlin, Lyons, & Ghetti, 2014;Hayne, Gross, McNamee, Fitzgibbon, & Tustin, 2011). However, children of this age are just starting to get to grips with the way events are ordered in time (Friedman, 2005;Hoerl & McCormack, 2019), and with the causal significance an event's being located in the past versus the future has for the present (Grant & Suddendorf, 2010;Zhang & Hudson, 2018). Preschoolers frequently make errors when locating and ordering events within time, particularly when reasoning about future, as opposed to past events (McColgan & McCormack, 2008;McCormack & Hanley, 2011), and the ability to think hypothetically about the future and counterfactually about the past continues to develop in important ways into middle childhood (Beck, Robinson, Carroll, & Apperly, 2006;Rafetseder, Cristi-Vargas, & Perner, 2010).…”

What Human Planning Can Tell Us About Animal Planning: An Empirical Case

“…However, an important concern with the just described Spoon tests is that it is unclear whether thinking about a future event is needed when making successful choices. In these tasks, selecting the correct item may only indicate that subjects know that, for example, the key is useful for unlocking the box now without having to represent its use in a future event (e.g., Martin-Ordas, 2018;Hoerl and McCormack, 2019). To address this issue, it is required to demonstrate that individuals have some understanding of what the future might entail.…”

“…To address this issue, it is required to demonstrate that individuals have some understanding of what the future might entail. Including a temporal component [i.e., before-and-after relationships; henceforth "temporal reasoning" (McCormack and Hoerl, 2011;Hoerl and McCormack, 2019)] will help assessing when in development the ability to envision the future emerges. Recently, Martin-Ordas (2018) addressed this issue by presenting 3-, 4-and 5-year-olds with a task in which, to secure a future need (e.g., play with a marble run game), children first had to obtain a key that allowed them next to access the marbles.…”

Thinking about thinking about time—ERRATUM

“…There was a misspelling in Adam Bulley's second affiliation in the original online version of the commentary by Redshaw et al (2019) on the target article by Hoerl & McCormack (2019). This has been corrected.…”