Space is a late heuristic of elapsing time: New evidence from the STEARC effect

To get a concrete representation of its intangible flow, culture frames elapsing time along spatially oriented mental or graphical lines, which are organised according to reading habits, from left to right in western cultures. One of the strongest evidence for this spatial representation of time is the STEARC effect (Spatial-Temporal Association of Response Codes), which consists of faster coding of short durations with motor responses in the left side of space and of long durations with responses in the right side. Here, we investigated the STEARC as a function of response speed in two different experiments in healthy participants. Surprisingly, in both sub-and supra-second ranges, we found the STEARC only when decisions on time durations were slow, while no spatial representation of time was present with fast decisions. This first demonstrates that space slowly takes over faster non-spatial processing of time flow and that it is possible to empirically separate the behavioural manifestations of the non-spatial and the nurtured spatial mechanisms of time coding.(c) 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

In order to represent the intangible flow of time in a concrete manner, culture organizes the elapsing time along spatially oriented mental or graphical lines, which are organized according to reading habits, from left to right in western cultures. The STEARC effect provides strong evidence for this spatial representation of time, showing faster coding of short durations with motor responses on the left side of space and of long durations with responses on the right side. Surprisingly, this study found that the STEARC effect was only present when decisions on time durations were slow, indicating that space gradually takes over faster non-spatial processing of time flow.