Making decisions with the future in mind: Developmental and comparative identification of mental time travel

doi:10.1016/j.lmot.2005.02.010

Learning and Motivation

Volume 36, Issue 2, May 2005, Pages 110-125

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lmot.2005.02.010 Get rights and content

Abstract

Mechanisms that produce behavior which increase future survival chances provide an adaptive advantage. The flexibility of human behavior is at least partly the result of one such mechanism, our ability to travel mentally in time and entertain potential future scenarios. We can study mental time travel in children using language. Current results suggest that key developments occur between the ages of three to five. However, linguistic performance can be misleading as language itself is developing. We therefore advocate the use of methodologies that focus on future-oriented action. Mental time travel required profound changes in humans’ motivational system, so that current behavior could be directed to secure not just present, but individually anticipated future needs. Such behavior should be distinguishable from behavior based on current drives, or on other mechanisms. We propose an experimental paradigm that provides subjects with an opportunity to act now to satisfy a need not currently experienced. This approach may be used to assess mental time travel in nonhuman animals. We conclude by describing a preliminary study employing an adaptation of this paradigm for children.

Section snippets

Future-oriented behavior

It is adaptive to act in ways that increase future survival chances, as long as this does not interfere with current survival needs. Many species display future-oriented behavior, behavior that makes sense only in the light of events that follow it. The adaptive function of behavior, however, has to be separated from the mechanisms that produce it. Future-oriented behavior may not always be based on the individual representing a temporally displaced event, just as mental time travel may not

Language and the development of mental time travel

Some argue that mental time travel is only made possible through language (e.g., Macphail, 2000). We do not think, however, that the absence of language in animals precludes them a priori from mental time travel. Instead, we have argued that the evolution of content must have preceded the evolution of means by which to communicate this content (Suddendorf & Corballis, 1997). Others claim that without language there may be no way of showing mental time travel in nonhuman animals because there

Mental time travel and changes in motivation

Before we introduce an approach on how we might test mental time travel in children and animals, we need to briefly digress and look at key implications of this ability on an organism’s motivational system. Perhaps it is best to tackle this issue from its most complex manifestations and then work down to what is essential. Let us therefore return to Dawkins’ open letter to Prince Charles in which he warns against naïve glorification of nature as the alternative to rational scientific approaches

Mental Time Travel in Action: A Proposal for a NonVerbal Test

Such a test should provide subjects with the opportunity to anticipate a future need. We can exclude simple learning explanations if no trial and error learning opportunity is provided. Analysis of performance on the first trial, for example, can rule out such an explanation. Instinctual explanations, in turn, can be excluded if the experimental scenario does not involve behavior typical of the species tested and if they can solve such problems in a variety of contexts. Coincidence, of course,

The rooms task: A preliminary investigation

Children spend time in an “empty room” and an “active room” and were allowed to take one of several items from the active room to the empty room. Instead of manipulating thirst, however, we created a scenario that drew on the child’s desire to play or avoid boredom. The only object in the empty room was a puzzle board without its puzzle pieces. The puzzle pieces were one of the options children could select in the active room to take back to the empty room. A pilot study demonstrated that

Results and discussion

There were no significant differences across gender and thus the data were collapsed. Analysis of the choices made between conditions revealed that children in the experimental condition were more likely to select the target toy than children in the control condition (χ² (1, N = 47) = 6.88, p = .009). This effect was present in the two older age groups, four-year-olds (χ² (1, N = 16) = 6.563, p = .01), and five-year-olds (χ² (1, N = 16) = 5.333, p = .021), but not in the three-year-olds. Both in the experimental and

Acknowledgments

Work on this manuscript was supported by an Australian Research Council Discovery Grant (DP0208300) to the first author. We thank Valerie Stone for helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper.

References (59)

C. Atance et al.
Episodic future thinking
Trends in Cognitive Sciences
(2001)
N.S. Clayton et al.
Prometheus to Proust: The case for behavioural criteria for ‘mental time travel’
Trends in Cognitive Sciences
(2003)
W.J. Friedman et al.
The effects of elapsed time and retrieval on young children’s judgements of the temporal distances of past events
Cognitive Development
(1998)
R.R. Hampton et al.
Episodic memory in nonhumans: what, and where, is when?
Current Opinion in Neurobiology
(2004)
L. Harner
Comprehension of past and future reference revisited
Journal of Experimental Child Psychology
(1980)
G. Hesslow
Conscious thought as simulation of behaviour and perception
Trends in Cognitive Sciences
(2002)
J.A. Hudson et al.
Planning in the preschool years: The emergence of plans from general event knowledge
Cognitive Development
(1991)
B. Levine
Autobiographical memory and the self in time
Brain and Cognition
(2004)
T. McCormack et al.
Memory and temporal perspective: The role of temporal frameworks in memory development
Developmental Review
(1999)
T. Suddendorf et al.
Mental time travel in animals?
Trends in Cognitive Sciences
(2003)

T. Suddendorf et al.

Like it or not? The mental time travel debate

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

(2003)

C. Thompson et al.

The development of future-oriented prudence and altruism in preschoolers

Cognitive Development

(1997)

M.K. Welch-Ross

An integrative model of the development of autobiographical memory

Developmental Review

(1995)

J.B. Benson

The development of planning: It’s about time

N. Bischof

Das Rätzel Ödipus [The Oedipus riddle]

(1985)

D. Bischof-Koehler

Kinder auf Zeitreise (Children’s time travel)

(2000)

D. Bischof-Köhler

Zur Phylogenese menschlicher Motivation [On the phylogeny of human motivation

E.V. Clark

On the acquisition of “before” and “after”

Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior

(1973)

N.S. Clayton et al.

Can animals recall the past and plan for the future

Nature Reviews Neuroscience

(2003)

N.S. Clayton et al.

Episodic-like memory during cache recovery by scrub jays

Nature

(1998)

N.S. Clayton et al.

Declarative and episodic-like memory in animals: Personal musings of a scrub jay

N.S. Clayton et al.

Scrub Jays (Aphelocoma coerulescens) form integrated memories of the multiple features of caching episodes

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes

(2001)

M.C. Corballis

Recursion as the key to the human mind

A. Damasio

Descartes’ error: emotion, reason, and the human brain

(1994)

Dawkins, R., 2000. An open letter to Prince Charles. Available from...

F.B.M. de Waal

Chimpanzee politics

(1982)

N.J. Emery et al.

Effects of experience and social context on prospective caching strategies by scrub jays

Nature

(2001)

W.J. Friedman

About time: Inventing the fourth dimension

(1990)

W.J. Friedman

The development of children’s knowledge of the times of future events

Child Development

(2000)

Cited by (294)

Intrinsic anticipatory motives in non-human primate food consumption behavior
2024, iScience
Future-oriented behavior is regarded as a cornerstone of human cognition. One key phenomenon through which future orientation can be studied is the delay of gratification, when consumption of an immediate reward is withstood to achieve a larger reward later. The delays used in animal delay of gratification paradigms are rather short to be considered relevant for studying human-like future orientation. Here, for the first time, we show that rhesus macaques exhibit human-relevant future orientation downregulating their operant food consumption in anticipation of a nutritionally equivalent but more palatable food with an unprecedentedly long delay of approximately 2.5 h. Importantly, this behavior is not a result of conditioning but intrinsic to the animals. Our results show that the cognitive time horizon of primates, when tested in ecologically valid foraging-like experiments, extends much further into the future than previously considered, opening up new avenues for translational biomedical research.
How does tourism memory affect revisit decisions? The mediating role of episodic future thinking
2023, Tourism Management Perspectives
Although scholars have explored how memorable tourism experiences affect tourists' behaviour, little research has considered the role of tourism memory from an autobiographical memory phenomenology perspective—particularly negative tourism memories. By combining the notion of mental time travel with the constructive episodic simulation hypothesis, this research proposes a theoretical framework describing the effects of positive and negative tourism memories on revisit intention through episodic future thinking. A questionnaire survey and two experiments jointly revealed that tourists' revisit intentions were stronger when memories of previous visits were positive. Episodic future thinking partly mediated the association between tourism memory valence and revisit intention. Moreover, positive external information could strengthen the effect of episodic future thinking on this intention. Results offer practical guidance on harnessing tourism memory to improve destinations' competitiveness.
Self-initiating and applying episodic foresight in middle childhood
2023, Journal of Experimental Child Psychology
This study provides an important extension to the growing literature on prospection in children by providing the first test of whether one’s ability to engage in the functional (as opposed to the purely phenomenological) aspect of episodic foresight improves across middle childhood. Of the various forms of prospection, episodic foresight has been proposed to be one of the most flexible and functionally powerful, defined as the ability to not only imagine future events (simulative aspect) but also use those imaginings to guide behavior in the present (functional aspect). The current study tested 80 typically developing children aged 8 to 12 years using an extensive cognitive battery comprising Virtual Week Foresight, the Autobiographical Interview, and a series of crystallized and fluid intelligence measures. Whereas data indicated age-related improvements in detecting future-oriented problems and taking steps in the present in service of solving these, all children in this age bracket demonstrated a similar capacity for problem resolution (i.e., the ability to subsequently solve successfully identified problems). Results also revealed the importance of broader crystallized and fluid intelligence, but not episodic memory or episodic future thinking, in engaging in this capacity. Research is now required to understand the real-life consequences of episodic foresight during this developmental period as well as the ways in which parents and teachers can help to foster this capacity and consequently help to support children’s growing desire for independence during this time.
Is leader proactivity enough: Importance of leader competency in shaping team role breadth efficacy and proactive performance
2023, Journal of Vocational Behavior
The present study is designed to investigate how leader proactive personality and competency jointly relate to team proactivity. Drawing on social cognitive theory, we hypothesize that proactive yet incompetent leaders diminish the magnitude and enhance the dispersion of team role breadth efficacy, defined as the collective confidence to engage in a range of integrative, interpersonal, and proactive tasks, which lowers team proactive performance. The test of the hypotheses, based on two waves of surveys of members of 66 professional work teams and their leaders, reveals three main findings. First, leaders' proactive personality is negatively associated with the magnitude and positively related to the dispersion of team role breadth efficacy when their competency is low. Second, proactive personality is positively associated with the magnitude, but not the dispersion, of team role breadth efficacy if their competency is high. Third, the leader proactivity-competency interactive effect relates positively to team proactive performance, through the mediation of the optimal configuration of team role breadth efficacy (high magnitude + low dispersion). This study thus highlights the need to consider both proactive personality and competency for team management and their implications for leaders' own career success.
“Look at the future”: Maintained fixation impoverishes future thinking
2022, Consciousness and Cognition
We evaluated the relationship between eye movements and future thinking. More specifically, we evaluated whether maintained fixation could influence cognitive characteristics of future thinking. We invited participants to imagine future events in two conditions: while freely exploring a white wall and while fixating a cross on the wall. Results demonstrated fewer and longer fixations, as well as fewer and shorter saccades during maintained fixation condition than in the free gaze condition. Shorter total amplitude of saccades was also observed during the maintained fixation condition than during the free-gaze condition. Regarding the cognitive characteristics of future thinking, fewer spatiotemporal details and less visual imagery, slower retrieval time, and shorter descriptions were observed for future thinking during maintained fixation than during free-gaze condition. These results demonstrate that maintaining fixation results in an effortful construction of future scenarios. We suggest that maintained fixation limits the cognitive resources that are required for future thinking.
Characteristics of episodic future thinking in anxiety: A systematic review and meta-analysis
2022, Clinical Psychology Review
Deficits in episodic future thinking (EFT) characteristics such as detail/vividness, specificity and the use of mental imagery are associated with psychopathology. However, whether these characteristics are associated with anxiety is not well understood. This article reports a systematic review and meta-analysis of research examining associations between anxiety and these EFT characteristics. Peer-reviewed studies that are published in the English language and contain at least one measure of anxiety and one measure of EFT characteristics were screened for inclusion in APAPsychINFO, CINAHL Plus and MEDLINE. Twenty-nine studies met the inclusion criteria. Results indicated that anxiety was not significantly correlated with detail/vividness overall. However, this was qualified by a moderating effect of cue valence. This finding is consistent with the Attentional Control and Contrast Avoidance Theories of anxiety, whereby higher anxiety is related to high detail/vividness in future thinking in the context of negatively-valenced cues, and conversely lower detail/vividness for positively-valenced cues. Anxiety was not significantly associated with specificity or the use of mental imagery. While heterogeneity and the low number of studies examining particular associations limited the findings, the results provide insight into the current state of the field and have both theoretical and clinical implications.

View all citing articles on Scopus

View full text

Making decisions with the future in mind: Developmental and comparative identification of mental time travel

Abstract

Section snippets

Future-oriented behavior

Language and the development of mental time travel

Mental time travel and changes in motivation

Mental Time Travel in Action: A Proposal for a NonVerbal Test

The rooms task: A preliminary investigation

Results and discussion

Acknowledgments

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

Cognitive Development

Current Opinion in Neurobiology

Journal of Experimental Child Psychology

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

Cognitive Development

Brain and Cognition

Developmental Review

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

Cognitive Development

Developmental Review

The development of planning: It’s about time

Das Rätzel Ödipus [The Oedipus riddle]

Kinder auf Zeitreise (Children’s time travel)

Zur Phylogenese menschlicher Motivation [On the phylogeny of human motivation

On the acquisition of “before” and “after”

Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior

Can animals recall the past and plan for the future

Nature Reviews Neuroscience

Episodic-like memory during cache recovery by scrub jays

Nature

Declarative and episodic-like memory in animals: Personal musings of a scrub jay

Scrub Jays (Aphelocoma coerulescens) form integrated memories of the multiple features of caching episodes

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes

Recursion as the key to the human mind

Descartes’ error: emotion, reason, and the human brain

Chimpanzee politics

Effects of experience and social context on prospective caching strategies by scrub jays

Nature

About time: Inventing the fourth dimension

The development of children’s knowledge of the times of future events

Child Development