Differences in time perspective predict differences in future simulations

Abstract

Future time perspective is a highly adaptive individual difference characteristic, but little is known about the cognitive mechanisms that facilitate these benefits. In this chapter, we discuss the relation between future time perspective and episodic future thinking, the capacity to simulate future events that may one day come to pass. Variation in one’s ability to simulate future events may underlie the degree to which one has a future time perspective. In particular, one’s capacity for autonoetic consciousness, or the sense that one is actually pre-living future events when undergoing mental simulation, may facilitate a future time perspective. The possible relation between future time perspective and episodic future thought and the potential implications of such a relation are discussed.