Time crawls when you're not having fun: feeling entitled makes dull tasks drag on

All people have to complete dull tasks, but individuals who feel entitled may be more inclined to perceive them as a waste of their "precious" time, resulting in the perception that time drags. This hypothesis was confirmed in three studies. In Study 1, participants with higher trait entitlement (controlling for related variables) thought dull tasks took longer to complete; no link was found for fun tasks. In Study 2, participants exposed to entitled messages thought taking a dull survey was a greater waste of time and took longer to complete. In Study 3, participants subliminally exposed to entitled words thought dull tasks were less interesting, thought they took longer to complete, and walked away faster when leaving the laboratory. Like most resources, time is a resource valued more by entitled individuals. A time-entitlement link provides novel insight into mechanisms underlying self-focus and prosocial dynamics.     

Culture and state boredom: A comparison between European Canadians and Chinese

The primary goal of the present research was to examine cross-cultural validity of the Multidimensional State Boredom Scale (MSBS) by comparing a European Canadian sample and a Chinese sample. The secondary goal was to explore cross-cultural differences in the actual experience of boredom between European Canadian and Chinese participants when they completed a psychological survey. After establishing cross-cultural validity of the MSBS by eliminating items that functioned differentially across the two cultural groups, we found that European Canadians scored higher on the MSBS than did Chinese. Results are consistent with the literature on cultural differences in ideal affect, such that European North Americans (vs. East Asians) tend to value high-arousal positive affects (e.g., excitement) more, and low-arousal positive affect less (Tsai, Knutson, & Fung, 2006).     

Cognitive and affective predictors of boredom proneness

Boredom proneness has been linked to various forms of cognitive and affective dysregulation including poor self-control and mind-wandering (MW), as well as depression and aggression. As such, understanding boredom and the associated cognitive and affective components of the experience, represents an important first step in combatting the consequences of boredom for psychological well-being. We surveyed 1928 undergraduate students on measures of boredom proneness, self-control, MW, depression and aggression to investigate how these constructs were related. Hierarchical regression analysis indicated that self-control operated as a strong negative predictor of boredom proneness. Finally, when controlling for age and self-control, we observed large decreases in the magnitudes of the relationships between boredom proneness and our other measures of interest. Together, these results imply a strong relationship between boredom proneness and cognitive and affective dysregulation, and show that individual levels of self-control can account for the lion’s share of variance in the relationships between boredom, cognition, and affect.     

Immortality and boredom: a response to Wisnewski

This article contributes to the ongoing debate initiated by Bernard Williams’ claim that, due to the non-contingent finitude of the categorical desires that give meaning to our lives, an immortal life would necessarily become intolerably boring. Jeremy Wisnewski has argued that even if immortality involves periods in which our categorical desires have been exhausted, this need not divest life of meaning since some categorical desires are revivable. I argue that careful reflection upon the thought-experiments adduced by Wisnewski reveals that they do not substantiate his proposal, and hence that a plausible reason for rejecting Williams’ position has not been provided.     

Sitting with it: An investigation of the relationship between trait mindfulness and sustained attention

BackgroundSustaining attention for extended periods of time is associated with negative affect and this increase in negative affect is related to poorer task performance. Trait mindfulness has been shown to be associated with better sustained attention performance. This may be because trait mindfulness is associated with better attention ability or better emotion regulation ability.AimsThe present research aims to replicate previous findings and better understand why trait mindfulness is associated with better sustained attention performance.MethodParticipants responded to self-report questionnaires assessing their trait mindfulness, attentional control, and experiential avoidance. Next, participants performed a sustained attention task, during which they also reported their subjective feelings of discomfort and boredom. Finally, participants reported their retrospective discomfort and boredom after the task.ResultsWe replicated and extended previous findings by showing that the relationship between trait mindfulness and sustained attention performance was mediated by negative affect experienced during the task. Moreover, the correlation between trait mindfulness and sustained attention disappeared when controlling for experiential avoidance, but remined when controlling for attention control.ConclusionOur results suggest that trait mindfulness is associated with sustained attention because of enhanced emotion regulation and that enhancing affective regulation would be an effective strategy for improving sustained attention performance.     

The effect of pain and the anticipation of pain on temporal perception: A role for attention and arousal

The overestimation of the duration of fear-inducing stimuli relative to neutral stimuli is a robust finding within the temporal perception literature. Whilst this effect is consistently reported with auditory and visual stimuli, there has been little examination of whether it can be replicated using painful stimulation. The aim of the current study was, therefore, to explore how pain and the anticipation of pain affected perceived duration of time. A modified verbal estimation paradigm was developed in which participants estimated the duration of shapes previously conditioned to be associated with pain, compared to those not associated with pain. Duration estimates were significantly longer on trials in which pain was received or anticipated than on control trials. Slope and intercept analysis revealed that the anticipation of pain resulted in steeper slopes and greater intercept values than for control trials. The results suggest that increased arousal and attention, when anticipating and experiencing pain, result in longer perceived durations. The results are discussed in relation to internal clock theory and neurocognitive models of time perception.     

Modality effects in memory for basic stimulus attributes: A temporal and nontemporal comparison

Previous research suggests that there are significant differences in the operation of reference memory for stimuli of different modalities, with visual temporal entries appearing to be more durable than auditory entries (Ogden, Wearden, & Jones, 2008 Ogden, R. S., Wearden, J. H. and Jones, L. A. 2008. The remembrance of times past: Interference in temporal reference memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 34: 1524–1544. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 2010). Ogden et al. (2008 Ogden, R. S., Wearden, J. H. and Jones, L. A. 2008. The remembrance of times past: Interference in temporal reference memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 34: 1524–1544. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 2010 Ogden, R. S., Wearden, J. H. and Jones, L. A. 2010. Are memories for duration modality specific?. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 63: 65–80. [Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) demonstrated that when participants were required to store multiple auditory temporal standards over a period of delay there was significant systematic interference to the representation of the standard characterized by shifts in the location of peak responding. No such performance deterioration was observed when multiple visually presented durations were encoded and maintained. The current article explored whether this apparent modality-based difference in reference memory operation is unique to temporal stimuli or whether similar characteristics are also apparent when nontemporal stimuli are encoded and maintained. The modified temporal generalization method developed in Ogden et al. (2008) Ogden, R. S., Wearden, J. H. and Jones, L. A. 2008. The remembrance of times past: Interference in temporal reference memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 34: 1524–1544. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar] was employed; however, standards and comparisons varied by pitch (auditory) and physical line length (visual) rather than duration. Pitch and line length generalization results indicated that increasing memory load led to more variable responding and reduced recognition of the standard; however, there was no systematic shift in the location of peak responding. Comparison of the results of this study with those of Ogden et al. (2008 Ogden, R. S., Wearden, J. H. and Jones, L. A. 2008. The remembrance of times past: Interference in temporal reference memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 34: 1524–1544. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 2010 Ogden, R. S., Wearden, J. H. and Jones, L. A. 2010. Are memories for duration modality specific?. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 63: 65–80. [Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) suggests that although performance deterioration as a consequence of increases in memory load is common to auditory temporal and nontemporal stimuli and visual nontemporal stimuli, systematic interference is unique to auditory temporal processing.     

Understanding non-work presenteeism: Relationships between emotional intelligence,boredom, procrastination and job stress

Non-work related presenteeism refers to the behaviour of employees who engage in personal activities instead of work-related activities whilst at work. Currently, limited research exists concerning non-work related presenteeism, despite the suggestion that it can financially impact organisations more than absenteeism. The aim of the present study was to examine whether any significant relationships existed between non-work related presenteeism and four theoretically linked psychological variables: emotional intelligence (EI), job stress, boredom, and procrastination. Data was collected via an online questionnaire. A sample of 57 male and 127 female full-time employees across several industries and organisations completed the surveys. As hypothesised, a significant relationship was observed between non-work related presenteeism and EI (r = −0.25), boredom (r = 0.33) and procrastination (r = 0.26). Self-reported levels of job stress, however, were not significantly related to non-work related presenteeism. These results suggest that developing EI and improving job-related engagement may decrease non-work presenteeism.     

The effect of scene structure on time perception

The current experiments examined the hypothesis that scene structure affects time perception. In three experiments, participants judged the duration of realistic scenes that were presented in a normal or jumbled (i.e., incoherent) format. Experiment 1 demonstrated that the subjective duration of normal scenes was greater than subjective duration of jumbled scenes. In Experiment 2, gridlines were added to both normal and jumbled scenes to control for the number of line terminators, and scene structure had no effect. In Experiment 3, participants performed a secondary task that required paying attention to scene structure, and scene structure's effect on duration judgements reemerged. These findings are consistent with the idea that perceived duration can depend on visual–cognitive processing, which in turn depends on both the nature of the stimulus and the goals of the observer.     

Stroke me for longer this touch feels too short: The effect of pleasant touch on temporal perception

Negative, painful, somatosensory stimulation lengthens the perceived duration of time. However, to date, no research has explored the influence of positive, pleasant, somatosensory stimulation on temporal perception. Here we asked whether gentle stroking touch influences perceptions of duration. Pleasant (gentle) and mildly unpleasant (rough) tactile stimulation was delivered whilst participants estimated the duration of a neutral visual stimulus. Pleasant touch resulted in shorter estimates of duration than unpleasant touch. There was no difference in duration perception in the unpleasant and control conditions. Taken together with the results of previous research (Ogden, Moore, Redfern, & McGlone, 2015), the results of this study suggest that pleasant and painful somatosensory stimulation have opposing effects on temporal perception, and additionally that pleasant touch can alter aspects of perceptual and attentional processing outside the purely affective domain.     

Boredom at work: towards a dynamic spillover model of need satisfaction,work motivation,and work-related boredom

Boredom occurs regularly at work and can have negative consequences. This study aimed to increase insight in the antecedents and processes underlying the development of work-related boredom by (a) examining whether work-related need satisfaction and the quality-of-work motivation mediate the associations between the work characteristics defined in the Job Characteristics Model and work-related boredom, (b) investigating if this motivational process operates both on an “enduring,” between-person level and a daily within-person level, and (c) examining if and how daily experiences of work-related boredom spill over to the next day. Data among employees were collected in a cross-sectional study (N = 115) and a 5-day daily diary study (N = 90). Study 1 results showed that need satisfaction and quality-of-work motivation mediated the association between work characteristics and work-related boredom. This motivational process was also found on a day-to-day basis in Study 2. This study further revealed that work-related boredom spills over to the next day through its associations with increased negative work attitudes and decreased intrinsic motivation. These findings provide insight in the process by which momentary experiences of boredom at work may develop into a more enduring experience of work-related boredom.     

Time flies: investigating the connection between intrinsic motivation and the experience of time

The present study investigated the relationship between intrinsic motivation and the subjective experience of time passing. The Work Preference Inventory, which measures trait intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, was administered to 75 undergraduate participants. Measures of time awareness, time estimation, checking of time, and perceived speed of time were collected using the experience sampling method. Participants carried electronic schedulers for five days and completed questionnaires each time the scheduler sounded (eight times per day). Results showed that higher intrinsic motivation was associated with checking and thinking about time less often, a subjective experience of time passing more quickly, and more of a tendency to lose track of time. The experience of time awareness was accompanied by a subjective sense of time moving slowly, a tendency to overestimate the time, and a more negative affective experience. These findings suggest that time perception is an important dimension of motivational experience.     

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

Temporal focus is the attention individuals devote to thinking about the past, present, and future, and the concept is important because it affects how people incorporate perceptions about past experiences, current situations, and future expectations into their attitudes, cognitions, and behavior. However, temporal focus has not been clearly defined nor situated in a nomological network of constructs. In addition, existing measures of temporal focus suffer from various shortcomings. In this paper, we advance the concept of temporal focus by critically examining its conceptualization, developing a new measure of temporal focus (Temporal Focus Scale; TFS), and evaluating the validity (i.e., construct, convergent, discriminant, nomological, and predictive validity) of the TFS across four studies. We conclude that understanding how individuals focus their attention toward the past, present, and future clarifies their responses to explicit and implicit temporal information, which suggests that a variety of research streams would benefit from incorporating the concept of temporal focus.     

The effect of level of construal on the temporal distance of activity enactment

A series of four studies demonstrates that, across different operationalizations of level of construal, different types of activities, and for both the self and another person as targets, construing activities in high-level terms fosters perception of the more distal future as appropriate for their enactment. Specifically, the studies show that thinking about superordinate “why” (rather than subordinate “how”) aspects of actions, about the implications of actions for one’s personality (rather than the objects that would be used in performing the action), and about abstract (rather than concrete) aspects of actions leads people to expect the actions to be performed in the more distant future. These results suggest that the association of level of construal and time perspective is bi-directional, in that time perspective affects level of construal and, in addition, level of construal affects time perspective.     

Individual differences in self-attributed mindfulness levels are related to the experience of time and cognitive self-control

The objective of this correlational study was to investigate how dispositional mindfulness is related to the experience of time as operationalized by the assessment of the time perspectives, impulsiveness, and duration judgment tasks. A sample of students (N = 63) completed self-report measures of mindfulness (FMI, CHIME), the time perspectives (ZTPI), impulsiveness (BIS), conducted psychophysical tasks of (a) auditory duration discrimination in the milliseconds range, (b) visual duration reproduction in the multiple-second range, and performed an attention task, the Attention Network Test. Being more mindful in daily life was related to less impulsiveness, better emotional handling of the past, and a more pronounced future perspective. Mindfulness was also related to more accurate timing in the milliseconds and multiple-seconds range but not to attentional control. These findings suggest a close association between dispositional mindfulness with the temporal organization of behaviour and the perception of time.     

Performance on auditory and visual temporal information processing is related to psychometric intelligence

The present study investigated the relationship between psychometric intelligence and temporal resolution power (TRP) as simultaneously assessed by auditory and visual psychophysical timing tasks. In addition, three different theoretical models of the functional relationship between TRP and psychometric intelligence as assessed by means of the Adaptive Matrices Test (AMT) were developed. To test the validity of these models, structural equation modeling was applied. Empirical data supported a hierarchical model that assumed auditory and visual modality-specific temporal processing at a first level and amodal temporal processing at a second level. This second-order latent variable was substantially correlated with psychometric intelligence. Therefore, the relationship between psychometric intelligence and psychophysical timing performance can be explained best by a hierarchical model of temporal information processing.     

The effect of mindfulness meditation on time perception

Research has increasingly focussed on the benefits of meditation in everyday life and performance. Mindfulness in particular improves attention, working memory capacity, and reading comprehension. Given its emphasis on moment-to-moment awareness, we hypothesised that mindfulness meditation would alter time perception. Using a within-subjects design, participants carried out a temporal bisection task, where several probe durations are compared to “short” and “long” standards. Following this, participants either listened to an audiobook or a meditation that focussed on the movement of breath in the body. Finally, participants completed the temporal bisection task for a second time. The control group showed no change after the listening task. However, meditation led to a relative overestimation of durations. Within an internal clock framework, a change in attentional resources can produce longer perceived durations. This meditative effect has wider implications for the use of mindfulness as an everyday practice and a basis for clinical treatment.     

The differential contribution of executive functions to temporal generalisation,reproduction and verbal estimation

Evidence from dual-task studies suggests that executive resources are recruited during timing. However, there has been little exploration of whether executive recruitment is universal across temporal tasks, or whether different temporal tasks recruit different executive resources. The current study explored this further by examining how individual differences in updating, switching, inhibition and access affected performance on temporal generalisation, reproduction and verbal estimation tasks. It was found that temporal tasks differentially loaded onto different executive resources. Temporal generalisation performance was related to updating and access ability. Reproduction performance was related to updating, access and switching. Verbal estimation performance was only related to access. The results suggest that executive resources may be recruited when monitoring and maintaining multiple durations in memory at the same time, and when retrieving duration representations from long-term memory. The findings emphasise the need to consider timing behaviour as the product of a wide range of complex, integrated, cognitive systems, rather than as the output of a clock in isolation.     

PTSD青少年对威胁图片注意偏向的时程特点及习惯化倾向

探讨创伤后应激障碍(post-traumatic stress disorder,PTSD)青少年(n=20)与创伤控制组(n=20)对威胁图片注意偏向的时间进程特点以及习惯化倾向.在线索提示任务中,图片的呈现时间为100ms、500ms和1250ms.研究表明:(1)在时间进程上,当图片呈现100ms时,创伤控制组对地震图存在注意警觉;当呈现时间为500ms时,两组被试对负性图和地震图存在注意回避;当呈现时间为1250ms时,PTSD组对负性图仍存在注意回避、对地震图的注意偏向消失,创伤控制组对负性图和地震图的注意偏向均消失.(2)在习惯化倾向上,当第六次呈现威胁图片时,PTSD组对负性图和地震图的注意偏向消失,而创伤控制组对负性图和地震图的注意回避仍未消失.