Author(s)

Julie Fonseca Cruz^1,2, Kévin Vidaud-Laperrière¹, Claire Brechet¹, Pom Charras^1*

¹EA 4556 EPSYLON, Univ Paul Valéry Montpellier 3, Univercity Montpellier, Montpellier, France.
²CHU Montpellier, University of Montpellier, Saint Eloi Hospital, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Unit (MPEA1), Montpellier, France.

According to a generalized magnitude system, the representation of time, space and number relies on a common cognitive mechanism. However, in the context of negative emotional stimuli, temporal durations undergo a subjective overestimation, while numerosity judgments are underestimated. This finding clearly challenged the existence of a generalized magnitude system. In this study, we aimed to investigate whether angry faces biases both temporal and spatial estimates compared to neutral faces in children aged 5 - 6-year-old and 9 - 10-year-old. Children were to judge as short or long either the temporal interval or the distance separating two visual stimuli in a bisection task. Overall, the study suggests that negative emotion with high arousal (angry faces) leads to a distortion of both duration and distance. Such distortion is reported early in development, even before the maturation of time perception.

Emotion, Time, Space, Children, AToM

Fonseca Cruz, J., Vidaud-Laperrière, K., Brechet, C. and Charras, P. (2020) Emotional Context Distorts Both Time and Space in Children. Journal of Behavioral and Brain Science, 10, 371-385. doi: 10.4236/jbbs.2020.109023.