Maria Grazia Carelli

A Global Look at Time: A 24-Country Study of the Equivalence of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory

In this article, we assess the structural equivalence of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory (ZTPI) across 26 samples from 24 countries (N = 12,200). The ZTPI is proven to be a valid and reliable index of individual differences in time perspective across five temporal categories: Past Negative, Past Positive, Present Fatalistic, Present Hedonistic, and Future. We obtained evidence for invariance of 36 items (out of 56) and also the five-factor structure of ZTPI across 23 countries. The short ZTPI scales are reliable for country-level analysis, whereas we recommend the use of the full scales for individual-level analysis. The short version of ZTPI will further promote integration of research in the time perspective domain in relation to many different psycho-social processes.

Sense of time and executive functioning in children and adults

A number of patient studies suggest that impairments in frontal lobe functions are associated with disorders in temporal information processing. One implication of these findings is that subjective experience of time should be related to executive functions regardless of etiology. In two experiments, we examined sense of time in relation to components of executive functioning in healthy children and adults. In Experiment 1, children between 8 to 12 years completed six experimental tasks that tapped three components of executive functioning: inhibition, updating, and mental shifting. Sense of time was examined in a duration judgment task in which participants reproduced stimulus durations between 4 to 32 s. In Experiment 2, adult participants completed the time reproduction task under varying concurrent task demands. Both experiments showed selective effects in that time reproduction errors were related to the inhibition and updating, but not to the shifting, components of executive functioning. However, the observed effects were modulated by task demands and age-related differences in cognitive competence. We conclude that individual differences in executive functioning are only weakly related to time reproduction performance in healthy children and adults.

Time Out of Mind: Temporal Perspective in Adults With ADHD

Objective: ADHD is often associated with difficulties in planning and time management. In this study, the authors examined the hypothesis that these functional problems in ADHD reflect systematic biases in temporal orientation. Method: To test this hypothesis, adults with ADHD (n = 30) and healthy controls (n = 60) completed the Swedish version of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory (S-ZTPI). Results: Although a majority of the ADHD participants were tested under stimulant medication, they showed significant differences in all the six subscales of the S-ZTPI. Logistic regression analysis, with age, education, depression, and response inhibition as covariates, showed that the Future Positive Scale was the primary predictor of ADHD status. Conclusion: These findings suggest that ADHD is associated with systematic biases in habitual time orientation and that these differences may contribute to functional problems in ADHD.

Time Keeping and Working Memory Development in Early Adolescence: A 4-Year Follow-Up.

In this longitudinal study, we examined time keeping in relation to working memory (WM) development. School-aged children completed two tasks of WM updating and a time monitoring task in which they indicated the passing of time every 5 min while watching a film. Children completed these tasks first when they were 8 to 12 years old and then 4 years later when they were 12 to 16 years old. Time keeping in early adolescence showed a different pattern of outcome measures than 4 years earlier, with reduced clock checking and increased timing error. However, relative changes in WM development moderated these adverse effects. Adolescents with greater relative gains in WM development were better calibrated than participants with less developing WM functions. We discuss these findings in relation to individual and developmental differences in executive control functions and socioemotionally driven reward seeking.

Insights into features of anxiety through multiple aspects of psychological time

Background: It is well-recognized that emotions and emotional disorders may alter the experience of time. Yet relatively little is known about different aspects of psychological time in relation to ...

Broadening the TP Profile: Future Negative Time Perspective

The importance of the future as an arena for planning, self-regulation and achievement has been of considerable interest in past research. The majority of this research suggests that future-oriented thinking has considerable benefits for psychological adjustment and wellbeing. The future is nevertheless not only a temporal space for goal-setting and positive expectations, it may also be associated with fear, uncertainty and anxiety, which may ultimately have detrimental effects on both mental and physical health. Here we present the outline for the Swedish ZTPI (S-ZTPI) which extends the original ZTPI by separating the Future dimension into two sub-factors: The Future Positive scale and the Future Negative scale. We argue that separating the future into two separate dimensions thus comprehending both a positive and a negative valence of the future, adds important information regarding association between future time perspective and subjective well-being.

Neural Correlates of Time Perspective

The primary aim of this chapter is to summarize our present knowledge about the neural correlates of time perspective and related constructs. We first briefly introduce functional magnetic resonance functional magnetic resonance imaging as a suitable technique to understand the underlying neural mechanisms when studying various constructs of time. Then, we discuss how the use of brain imaging techniques has improved our knowledge regarding concepts of time perspective. In this section it becomes evident that most studies have focused on mental time traveling. Finally we introduce a novel line of research in which we try to study neural correlates of time within the context of the Zimbardo framework. By such approach we are able to include the personality-like construct from the ZTPI to further understand the neural correlates of temporal processing.

Cognitive Processes in Time Perspective

In this chapter we explore the role of cognitive processes in time perspective. Extending previous findings, we present how individual differences in time orientation are related to intelligence, goal-directed behaviour, executive control and meta-cognition. First, we show that present fatalistic TP is negatively related to intelligence, and that future-oriented individuals tend to have higher general abilities. Further, we present the data, proving that risk taking is negatively correlated with the future positive scale. Another finding discussed here is that working memory development is a strong predictor of temporal orientation. Children who have efficient working memory updating functions in early school age exhibit higher tendency toward future positive when they are adolescents. Finally, our studies indicate, that time perspectives tend to correlate with meta-cognitive skills, knowledge and experiences, suggesting that the temporal orientation influences meta-cognition.

Timelines of past events: Reconstructive retrieval of temporal patterns.

Most naturalistic events are temporally and structurally complex in that they comprise a number of elements and that each element may have different onset and offset times within the event. This study examined temporal information processing of complex patterns of partially overlapping stimulus events by using 2 tasks of temporal processing. Specifically, participants observed a pantomime in which 5 actors appeared on the scene for different periods of time. At test, they estimated the duration each actor was present or reconstructed the temporal pattern of the pantomime by drawing a timeline for each actor. Participants made large errors in the time estimation task, but they provided relatively accurate responses by using the timeline as a retrieval support. These findings suggest that temporal processing of complex asynchronous events is a challenging cognitive task, but that reliance on visuo-spatial retrieval support, possibly in combination with other temporal heuristics, may produce functional approximations of complex temporal patterns.

Time Perspective in Late Adulthood : aging patterns in past, present and future dimensions, deviations from balance, and associations with subjective well-being

We examined cross-sectional aging patterns for subscales of the Swedish version of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory in a population-based sample of older adults (60–90 years; N = 447). Alter ...