title: Prisms to travel in time: Investigation of time-space association through prismatic adaptation effect on mental time travel.
abstract: Accumulating evidence suggests that humans process time and space in similar veins. Humans represent time along a spatial continuum, and perception of temporal durations can be altered through manipulations of spatial attention by prismatic adaptation (PA). Here, we investigated whether PA-induced manipulations of spatial attention can also influence more conceptual aspects of time, such as humans' ability to travel mentally back and forward in time (mental time travel, MTT). Before and after leftward- and rightward-PA, participants projected themselves in the past, present or future time (i.e., self-projection), and, for each condition, determined whether a series of events were located in the past or the future with respect to that specific self-location in time (i.e., self-reference). The results demonstrated that leftward and rightward shifts of spatial attention facilitated recognition of past and future events, respectively. These findings suggest that spatial attention affects the temporal processing of the human self.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Bologna, 40127 Bologna, Italy; Fondazione Salvatore Maugeri Hospital IRCCS, 46042 Castel Goffredo, Italy. Electronic address: filomena.anelli@unibo.it.
authors.forename: Filomena
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Anelli
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Bologna, 40127 Bologna, Italy; Centro Studi e Ricerche in Neuroscienze Cognitive, 47023 Cesena, Italy.
authors.forename: Elisa
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Ciaramelli
authors.affiliation: Neuropsychiatry Lab, Faculty of Medicine, Hadassah Hebrew University Medical School, 91200 Jerusalem, Israel; Department of Neurology, Hadassah Hebrew University Medical Center, 91200 Jerusalem, Israel.
authors.forename: Shahar
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Arzy
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Bologna, 40127 Bologna, Italy; Fondazione Salvatore Maugeri Hospital IRCCS, 46042 Castel Goffredo, Italy.
authors.forename: Francesca
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Frassinetti
mesh_terms: D000222:Adaptation, Physiological; D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007092:Imagination; D008297:Male; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D013028:Space Perception; D013998:Time Perception; D014796:Visual Perception; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Mental time travel; Prismatic adaptation; Self-projection; Self-reference; Spatial attention; Time representation