Nature and nurture effects on the spatiality of the mental time line

Filomena Anelli; Gregory Peters-Founshtein; Yaen Shreibman; Elior Moreh; Chiara Forlani; Francesca Frassinetti; Shahar Arzy

doi:10.1038/s41598-018-29584-3

Nature and nurture effects on the spatiality of the mental time line

Filomena Anelli^*, Gregory Peters-Founshtein, Yaen Shreibman, Elior Moreh, Chiara Forlani, Francesca Frassinetti, Shahar Arzy

^*Corresponding author for this work

Department of Medical Neurobiology

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

15 Scopus citations

Abstract

The nature-nurture debate regarding the origin of mental lines is fundamental for cognitive neuroscience. We examined natural-nurture effects on the mental time line, applying three different challenges to the directionality of time representation. We tested (1) patients with left-neglect and healthy participants, who are (2) left-to-right or right-to-left readers/writers, using (3) a lateralized left-right button press or a vocal mode in response to a mental time task, which asks participants to judge whether events have already happened in the past or are still to happen in the future. Using lateralized responses, a spatial-temporal association of response code (STEARC) effect was found, in concordance with the cultural effects. With vocal responses (no lateralization), past and future events showed similar results in both cultures. In patients with neglect, who have a deficit of spatial attention in processing the left side of space, future events were processed more slowly and less accurately than past events in both cultures. Our results indicate the existence of a “natural” disposition to map past and future events along a horizontal mental time line, which is affected by the different ways in which spatial representation of time is introduced.

Original language	American English
Article number	11710
Journal	Scientific Reports
Volume	8
Issue number	1
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-29584-3
State	Published - 1 Dec 2018

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
The authors gratefully acknowledge Prof. Anna M. Borghi and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on a previous version of this article. This work was supported by RFO (Ricerca Fondamentale Orientata, Ministry of University and Research), by a grant from Ministero della Salute (Ricerca Finalizzata PE Estero Theory-enhancing, Grant no. PE-2016-02362477, URL Ministero della Salute: http://www.salute.gov.it/portale/ministro/p4_10_1_1_ atti_1_1.jsp?lingua=italiano&id=135), and by the Israeli Science Foundation (ISF, Grant no. 315/16)) and the Agnes Ginges center of Neurogenetics - Orion Foundation. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2018, The Author(s).

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10.1038/s41598-018-29584-3

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title = "Nature and nurture effects on the spatiality of the mental time line",

abstract = "The nature-nurture debate regarding the origin of mental lines is fundamental for cognitive neuroscience. We examined natural-nurture effects on the mental time line, applying three different challenges to the directionality of time representation. We tested (1) patients with left-neglect and healthy participants, who are (2) left-to-right or right-to-left readers/writers, using (3) a lateralized left-right button press or a vocal mode in response to a mental time task, which asks participants to judge whether events have already happened in the past or are still to happen in the future. Using lateralized responses, a spatial-temporal association of response code (STEARC) effect was found, in concordance with the cultural effects. With vocal responses (no lateralization), past and future events showed similar results in both cultures. In patients with neglect, who have a deficit of spatial attention in processing the left side of space, future events were processed more slowly and less accurately than past events in both cultures. Our results indicate the existence of a “natural” disposition to map past and future events along a horizontal mental time line, which is affected by the different ways in which spatial representation of time is introduced.",

author = "Filomena Anelli and Gregory Peters-Founshtein and Yaen Shreibman and Elior Moreh and Chiara Forlani and Francesca Frassinetti and Shahar Arzy",

note = "Funding Information: The authors gratefully acknowledge Prof. Anna M. Borghi and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on a previous version of this article. This work was supported by RFO (Ricerca Fondamentale Orientata, Ministry of University and Research), by a grant from Ministero della Salute (Ricerca Finalizzata PE Estero Theory-enhancing, Grant no. PE-2016-02362477, URL Ministero della Salute: http://www.salute.gov.it/portale/ministro/p4_10_1_1_ atti_1_1.jsp?lingua=italiano&id=135), and by the Israeli Science Foundation (ISF, Grant no. 315/16)) and the Agnes Ginges center of Neurogenetics - Orion Foundation. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2018, The Author(s).",

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N2 - The nature-nurture debate regarding the origin of mental lines is fundamental for cognitive neuroscience. We examined natural-nurture effects on the mental time line, applying three different challenges to the directionality of time representation. We tested (1) patients with left-neglect and healthy participants, who are (2) left-to-right or right-to-left readers/writers, using (3) a lateralized left-right button press or a vocal mode in response to a mental time task, which asks participants to judge whether events have already happened in the past or are still to happen in the future. Using lateralized responses, a spatial-temporal association of response code (STEARC) effect was found, in concordance with the cultural effects. With vocal responses (no lateralization), past and future events showed similar results in both cultures. In patients with neglect, who have a deficit of spatial attention in processing the left side of space, future events were processed more slowly and less accurately than past events in both cultures. Our results indicate the existence of a “natural” disposition to map past and future events along a horizontal mental time line, which is affected by the different ways in which spatial representation of time is introduced.

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Nature and nurture effects on the spatiality of the mental time line

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