Psychological time: the time you don’t see

“To accomplish great things, two things are needed: a plan and not much time” (Leonard Bernstein).

Hello friends!

Philip Zimbardo is best known for his Stanford imprisonment experiment in the 1970s. In this experiment, he selected university participants to spend a month in a simulated jail, some as guards and others as inmates.

One of the conclusions of the research was that, practically from the beginning, the participants forgot that it was an experiment and experienced their position in the place.

In the book Time Paradox, The Time Paradox, Writing with Jon Boyd, Zimbardo mentions the experiment and interprets it through psychological time. As in Reality Shows (although with certain differences), the participants enter the game because each one has a particular experience about time. Those who have a more distant view of the future may not be so involved with current problems and difficulties. Whereas those who are more present-oriented can actually step into the current situation, like a prisoner, guard or “brother” or “farmer”.

In this text, I will comment on the paradoxes of time, on psychological time. On another occasion, we will be able to delve into the imprisonment experiment.

the psychological time

In the third chapter of Ulysses, by James Joyce, entitled Proteus, we find the thought: “I am, a stride at a time. A very short space of time through very short time of space” – “I am, one step at a time. A small space of time through small times of space”.

It doesn’t matter how we can conceive of time, time – difficult to define as Saint Augustine says, but we all know what it is – is always related to space. From hourglasses to ancient sundials, including calendars, birth charts or modern chronometers. There is constantly the description of time by space. Like representations of time as a timeline, from left to right or like on facebook or twitter, from bottom to top (or top to bottom).

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In general, we learn in school and in our culture that time is objective. Today is day X, month Y, year Z. And now it’s 15:17. And, because it is something so pervasive, so ingrained in our idea of reality, we forget that all these numbers are created by the mind, maintained by memory and are just representations and conventions.

In other words, we convene time for practical purposes. To make it easier, for example, for two or more people to meet by letting everyone know when to go.

But the most interesting thing about time is that everyone has a psychological time that is slightly (or totally) different from other people.

1) The paradox of time: unconsciousness

Zimbardo writes in his book: “Time has the most powerful influence on our thoughts, feelings and actions, yet we are generally unaware of the effect of time on our lives.”

To prove this paradox, Zimbardo reports another experiment, carried out by psychologists John Darley and Dan Batson. At Principton University, a group of students had to prepare a talk on the Bible’s parable of the Good Samaritan. This group was divided into two: 1) before going to the presentation, this sub-group heard that they were late and that they had few minutes and should run to the venue; 2) in the second sub-group, the researchers said the opposite, that they still had plenty of time before their speech.

On the way, the researchers inserted a person who pretended to be down, who anyone could imagine was in need of help.

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How would group 1, who was in a hurry, and group 2, who had time, react?

The result was as expected. Even bearing in mind the parable of the good Samaritan in the speech they would have to give next, sub-group 1, because they were in a hurry, did not stop to help, most of them (90% did not stop). The people in the other sub-group all individually stopped to help.

This research demonstrates that researchers’ subtle manipulation of time – telling them there was or wasn’t time for a task – changed behavior. And, therefore, the experiment illustrates the paradox that we do not pay attention to the way in which the conception of time influences what we do or do not do.

2) The paradox of time: present and future

The second paradox says the following: “each attitude towards time – or the individual perspective on time – is associated with numerous benefits, but in excess it is also associated with great losses”.

There are people who live more in the future than in the present and others live more in the present and leave thinking about the future for later. As the paradox says, there are advantages and disadvantages.

Focusing attention on the future helps academic, professional and financial achievements. But it can be a source of unnecessary anxiety and worry. Focusing attention on the present implies being more considerate of others, but it can also lead to self-destructive behaviors, such as alcohol, drug or gambling addictions.

In the text, 10 differences between the richest and poorest, we show that the richest think, in terms of their finances, in projects of ten, twenty and even thirty years.

3) The paradox of time: individuality and society

And, finally, the third paradox says: “individual attitudes about time are learned through personal experiences, however, collective attitudes about time influence the destiny of nations”.

Anyone who has studied anthropology has certainly seen that there are enormous distances between cultures, also in terms of time. For example, seconds were not counted before the Industrial Revolution.

What must be considered is that time is our greatest asset. This means that the phrase time is money is misleading. We cannot save time as we do money for later use. Time passes and there is no way to get it back.

Conclusion

To conclude, it is inevitable to remember that our lifetime is not short. And Steve Jobs helps us finish the text: “Remembering that I will be dead soon is the most important tool I have ever encountered to help me make big decisions” (Steve Jobs).