Temporal focus: Thinking about the past, present, and future

doi:10.1016/j.copsyc.2018.04.005

Current Opinion in Psychology

Volume 26, April 2019, Pages 37-43

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2018.04.005 Get rights and content

Highlights

•
Temporal focus is characteristic thought about the past, present, and future.
•
Past focus has maladaptive work and life outcomes such as depression.
•
Present focus increases life satisfaction, but correlates with impulsive behaviors.
•
Future focus is more cognitive in nature and leads to life and work achievements.
•
Emerging research views temporal focus as multilevel, spatial, and profile-based.

We review recent findings on temporal focus — the degree to which individuals think about the past, present, and/or future. Hypothetically, focusing on each time period could be beneficial as one can learn from the past, savor the present moment, and plan for the future. Yet research demonstrates that characteristically thinking about the past is disadvantageous, thinking about the future is advantageous, and thinking about the present has mixed outcomes. This paper examines these findings to consider where individuals should focus their attention in time, highlighting established (e.g., country level differences) and emerging (e.g., temporal focus profiles) research on the topic.

Section snippets

What is temporal focus?

Temporal focus is the extent to which individuals characteristically direct their attention to the past, present, and/or future [2••, 3, 4••, 5••].³ To varying degrees, individuals live in the moment, dwell on the past, or dream of the future. The

What is the impact of temporal focus?

To date, each temporal focus dimension has strongly impacted many attitudinal and behavioral outcomes. Research demonstrates that past-focused individuals experience lower well-being, especially depression and dissatisfaction with life [4••, 5••, 35•, 39, 40, 41, 42•]. Particularly when measured by the past-negative dimension of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory (ZTPI),⁴

The future of temporal focus

Beyond the findings we just reviewed, we also note three interesting developments that are emerging. First, research increasingly investigates temporal focus beyond the individual level using different methods. Recent research spans many levels, including dyads [70], teams [71], and countries [25]. In addition, we also note that access to ‘big data’ offers a potentially unobtrusive way to study temporal focus at these different levels by coding available data rather than surveying participants [

Conclusion

Despite individuals characteristically thinking about the past, present, and future to varying degrees, our review demonstrates that thinking about the future may be the most beneficial to life and work outcomes. At first glance, the key takeaway may be to focus mostly on the future, downplaying the past and only thinking about the present as needed to enact one's future plans. Yet emerging work on temporal focus profiles indicates that such a conclusion may be premature. A better approach may

Conflict of interest statement

Nothing declared.

References and recommended reading

Papers of particular interest, published within the period of review, have been highlighted as:

• of special interest
•• of outstanding interest

Acknowledgements

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

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This study examines the individual intention to use implant and wearable technologies as a function of demographics and personality characteristics. Inter-individually differing use intentions towards such disruptive and potentially high-impact innovations could further exacerbate social disparities. This cross-sectional non-experimental study (N = 586) examines participants' willingness to use cyborg products as a function of age, biological sex, and trait temporal focus. Multiple regression results reveal that higher levels of age reduced intention to use cyborg products and that women reported lower levels of use intention compared to males. Additionally, higher levels of present focus and higher levels of future focus increased intention to use cyborg products. Moderation results suggest that with increasing levels of past focus the negative effect of age increased. Even though present and future focus did not moderate the effects of sex and age both focuses can be used independently to promote use intentions. Among other suggestions we encourage the use of experimental approaches and interventions in future research to promote present and future focus for specific target groups to foster their cyborg technology use intentions.
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When faced with a sudden economic crisis, top managers come under pressure to persist and recover, but such an ability to be resilient depends on the collective response of the top management team (TMT). In particular, we argue that attention towards the future, or future focus, within the TMT influences the organization's resilience in times of crisis. Drawing on a sample of insurance companies during the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), we mined earnings call transcripts to capture future focus for executives and aggregate this variable to the team level. Our results indicate that companies with TMTs high on average future focus, and companies with TMTs low on heterogeneity of future focus are more resilient - experiencing more moderate performance losses during the crisis and a swifter recovery after the crisis. With heightened attention on long-term effects of economic crises, we contribute to scholarship and practice by demonstrating that future focus within executive teams impacts their organization's resilience.
The influence of temporal focus on individual intertemporal decision-making in life history strategy framework
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Temporal factors have an important role in intertemporal decision-making. Temporal focus is the extent to which individuals characteristically direct their attention to the past, present, and/or future. Temporal focus can influence resource allocation. It was not known, however, whether temporal focus might affect intertemporal decision-making. The purpose of this study is to investigate how life history strategies and temporal focus together influence intertemporal decision-making. Study 1 used a questionnaire to preliminarily explore the relationship between temporal focus and intertemporal decision-making. Results showed that temporal focus was positively associated with individuals' intertemporal decision preferences, and the more individuals preferred future focus, the higher their rate of temporal discounting. Study 2 examined the joint effect of the temporal focus and life history strategy on intertemporal decision-making by manipulating the temporal focus of individuals with different life history strategies. The manipulation of temporal focus influenced intertemporal decision preferences of fast strategy individuals, that is, the short-term small reward in the future focus and the long-term large reward in the past focus, but has no effect on the intertemporal decision preference of slow strategy individuals. The entire study confirms life history theory and validates the role of perceptual time-based models in intertemporal decision-making.
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Ultraviolet (UV) photography and photoaging visuals make hidden sun damage visible to the naked eye, granting the potential to create messages that vary in temporal dimensionality. As UV photos depict immediate skin damage, the photo communicated that exposure in sun causes invisible damage to the young truck driver (near temporal frame) and visible damage (e.g., wrinkles) to the old truck driver (distant temporal frame).
The current study examines the moderating effects of loss/gain frames and temporality variables on the relationship between temporal framing and sun safe behavioral expectations.
U.S. adults (N = 897) were assigned to a 2 (near/distant temporal frame) × 2 (gain/loss frame) between-participants experiment.
The loss frame triggered greater fear compared to the gain frame, this fear forms an indirect path where loss frames increase fear and fear increases changes in sun safe behavioral expectations. Participants exposed to the distant frame had increased behavior expectations if either of the two temporality variables (CFC - future or current focus) were low. Participants with low temporality indicators (i.e., CFC - future, current focus, or future focus) exposed to the gain frame had increased behavior expectations.
The findings demonstrate the potential utility of temporal frames as a tool for designing strategic health messages.
Organizational Nostalgia: The Construct, the Scale and its Implications for Organizational Functioning
2024, British Journal of Management
A cross-cultural examination of temporal orientation through everyday language on social media
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View full text

Temporal focus: Thinking about the past, present, and future

Highlights

Section snippets

What is temporal focus?

What is the impact of temporal focus?

The future of temporal focus

Conclusion

Conflict of interest statement

References and recommended reading

Acknowledgements

J Pers Soc Psychol

Int J Psychol

Rev Gen Psychol

Science (80-).

Curr Psychol

Pers Individ Diff

Acad Manage J

Basic Appl Soc Psych

Pers Indiv Diff

Motiv Emot

Int J Psychol

Psychol Sci

Acad Manage Res

Pers Individ Diff

Toward a theory of episodic memory: the frontal lobes and autonoetic consciousness

Psychol Bull

The Human Organization of Time

Future Time Perspective and Motivation: Theory and Research Method

Conceptualization and measurement of temporal focus: the subjective experience of the past, present, and future

Org Behav Hum Dec Process

The Principles of Psychology

Explorations in Personality: A Clinical and Experimental Study of Fifty Men of College Age

Defining the “field at a given time.,”

Psychol Rev

Field Theory in Social Science: Selected Theoretical Papers

Taking time to integrate temporal research

Acad Manage Rev

The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge

Variations in Value Orientations

Time and behavior in organizations

Temporal Matters in Social Psychology

How do adolescents see their future? A review of the development of future orientation and planning

Dev Rev

Future orientation and socialization

Int J Psychol

Punitive parenting and delinquency: the mediating role of short-term mindsets

Br J Criminol

Parents’ influence on children's future orientation and saving

J Econ Psychol

Cultural diversity in people's understanding and uses of time

Appl Psychol

Culture's Consequences: Comparing Values, Behaviors, Institutions, and Organizations across Nations

The pace of life in 31 countries

J Cross Cult Psychol

Looking into the past: cultural differences in perception and representation of past information

J Pers Soc Psychol

Language shapes people's time perspective and support for future-oriented policies

Am J Pol Sci

Time reflected in cultural and linguistic representation

Curr Opin Psychol

A short-term longitudinal examination of the associations between self-control, delay of gratification and temporal considerations, Pers

Individ Dif

Time perspective and age: a review of age associated differences

Front Psychol

Living in the past, present, and future: measuring temporal orientation with language

J Pers

Taking time seriously: a theory of socioemotional selectivity

Am Psychol

Future time perspective in the work context: a systematic review of quantitative studies

Front Psychol

Future-oriented thinking and adjustment in a nationwide longitudinal study following the September 11th terrorist attacks

Motiv Emot