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Updated: Jul 17, 2025
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A Two-interval Forced-choice Task for Multisensory Comparisons
Published on: November 9, 2018
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Iconicity bias and duration
Laura Jane Kelly1, Sangeet Khemlani1
1US Naval Research Laboratory, Navy Center for Applied Research in Artificial Intelligence.
Journal of Experimental Psychology. Learning, Memory, and Cognition
|September 7, 2023
Summary
People prefer descriptions of event durations that align with how we mentally visualize time. This temporal reasoning bias favors mentioning event starts before event ends, reflecting an iconic representation of time.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Linguistics
- Cognitive Science
Background:
- Temporal relation descriptions can be ambiguous.
- Existing theories suggest mental simulation of event durations.
- Iconic representation of time is a proposed cognitive mechanism.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the iconicity bias in temporal reasoning.
- To test the prediction that people prefer start-before-end descriptions.
- To determine if this bias is linked to conscious evaluation of durations.
Main Methods:
- Six experiments were conducted.
- Participants evaluated descriptions of durational events.
- Reasoners' preferences for congruent vs. incongruent descriptions were analyzed.
Main Results:
- A significant iconicity bias was observed.
- Participants preferred descriptions mentioning event starts before event ends.
- This bias was evident during conscious duration evaluation.
Conclusions:
- The findings support the theory of iconic mental models for temporal reasoning.
- Reasoners exhibit a preference for descriptions congruent with iconic time scanning.
- Iconicity bias influences how people interpret and reason about event durations.
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