Motivation and emotion/Book/2024/Transcendental future time perspective, motivation, and emotion

Transcendental future time perspective, motivation, and emotion:
What are the motivational and emotional aspects of transcendental future time perspective?

Multimedia presentation (3 min)

Overview

Think about this: Figure 1. Egyptian book of the dead depicting the scene where a good soul is presented to Osiris Imagine you are a scribe in Ancient Egypt. You have had the good fortune to learn to read and write and are a highly valued member of society due to this skill. You have also grown up learning about the afterlife or Duat, about the Sun God Ra's journey across the underworld, and about what awaits you when you die. You know that when your soul passes onto the next realm, you have to weigh your heart against the feather of the goddess Ma'at, and you will only be allowed to greet the god of the dead Osiris and enter the field of reeds if your heart weighs less than it (See Figure 1). Your heart will only weigh less than the feather if you committed good deeds throughout your life and were honourable. As such, what would your actions and behaviours look like in life? And why would you be inclined to behave in a certain way? Would you be afraid for your soul after death? Or would you remain satisfied that you have done all you could in life and will await your judgement in the afterlife without worries?

Time, as perceived by humans, is a linear, never-ending progression of events that people have attempted to comprehend for as long as humanity has existed, with written records of the study of time dating back to the 20th century (Timoszyk-Tomczak & Bugajska, 2019). Time helps create our perception of our own reality, and allows us to comprehend our existence and about the inevitability of endings. Multiple civilisations even had gods of time (See Figure 2.) because it was a crucial concept inherent to our existence as a species.

In Psychology, time is personal, biased and conditioned by one's own experiences; it is subjective and malleable. Humans are uniquely capable of understanding the concept of time as we have the ability to mentally travel through our perception of time to relive past events or pre-live future events through episodic memory functioning (Tulving, 1972). The idea of travelling to past or future moments also forces us to confront and conceptualise our own mortality through the generational, metaphysical and personal contexts connected to our experience with and fear of death.

Think back to our scenario above, when you know what the afterlife would be like during your lifetime, how would you perceive death? Would you fear your mortality or would it appease your worries to know that there is something greater waiting for you after your current timeline?

Transcendental Future Thinking Perspective (TFTP) is a psychological construct that delves into the belief of time after death, from death to eternity (Zimbardo & Boyd, 1997). It challenges the linear perception of time by positing the idea of a symbolic immortality - human consciousness - that can transcend the boundaries of perceived time due to our ability to mentally travel to the past or future. It attempts to decipher infinite time and is based in philosophy, faith and spirituality . Throughout this chapter, we will attempt to understand TFTP and how it can influence emotions and could inspire motivation and action towards an aspirational goal of a specific type of time after death.

Focus questions: What is transcendental future time perspective? Why is it important to understand the cognitive processes behind transcendental future thinking? What can transcendental future time perspective explain about life and death? How does the ability to mentally travel through time to a possible time after death affect our emotions and motivations?

Time perspective

Figure 2. Chronos, the Greek God of Time

Time Perspective theory attempts to explain the individual perceptions of time, and how this influences human behaviour, emotions and actions within their respective temporality. It attempts to understand each individual's perception of time by observing the subjective modality of living the time and its effects on various domains of human existence (Mannino et al., 2017). Humans create mental temporal categories to process daily life and cognitive processes divide human experience into three temporal frames (Keough, Zimbardo, & Boyd, 1999):

• Past
• Present
• Future

It is an unconscious psychological process of conceptualising time to understand life and has a pervasive, unrecognised and under-utilised influence on human behaviour (Zimbardo & Boyd, 1999). Variations within time perspective are learned through personal, social, systematic, and institutional biases and influences and is different for each individual based on their upbringing, culture, values and beliefs.

Zimbardo's time perspective inventory

The time perspective inventory is a 56 item self-report questionnaire that is a standardised measure of an individual's unique time perspective traits. The way each individual perceives time is calculated and the results describe their preferred temporality (See Figure 3.), which are categorised into the following temporal frames:

Temporality	Associated traits
Past Negative	tend to focus on negative memories from the past, negative view of life and associated with depression and PTSD
Past Positive	happy and positive memories of the past with high levels of self esteem and a healthy outlook on life
Present Fatalistic	do not believe in taking responsibility for the outcome of one's own life due to belief in predetermined future or fate, is associated with apathy in making life-choices, depression and anti-social behaviour
Present Hedonistic	driven by positivity, enjoyment and excitement without worry about future rewards. Associated with pleasure seeking and risky behaviours, and lack of conscientiousness, consistency and impulse control
Future	forward thinkers, planners, organisers for the future, highly reward driven and employ delayed gratification. Associated with high achievers, good impulse control and proper well-being

Optimal Orientation: they realised that a temporality of high past-positive, moderate present-hedonistic, moderate future, low past negative and low present fatalistic was the optimal temporality for an individual to maintain overall well-being

Figure 3. Zimbardo's Time Perspective Inventory results

The future orientation was split into the Future Negative and Future Positive scale to define the differences in the future perspective, and they found that negative future orientation was the central dimension for temporality, people were generally less future positive (Carelli et al., 2011).

In 2017, a three factor future model was also introduced with the variables of opportunity, extension, and constraints within future orientation (Rohr et al., 2017).

Transcendental future time perspective

Figure 4. Space - a place of time after death

TFTP extends beyond the time perspective theory and is founded upon philosophical inquiries about time, human consciousness and spiritual ideas of an afterlife. Humans have the cognitive capacity to comprehend the passage of time, and thus possess an awareness of the inevitability of death.

Transcendental future is associated with the capacity to believe in, think about, and imagine immortality, and engage with the concept of the non-linearity of time as part of this immortal future, which is a uniquely human ability (Stolarski et al., 2019). The capacity to engage in episodic future thinking to relive the past or stimulate future events, transcending the boundaries of linear time by imagining a time after death or before birth, can alter one's perception of time, reality, and of life itself.

Zimbardo's transcendental future time perspective inventory

This is also a self-report questionnaire, which attempts to understand how an individual's beliefs about the afterlife, spirituality, and potential religiosity influences an individual's overall temporal traits. The answers to the questions are reported on a scale of "Very Untrue" to "Very True" and involve statements that questions spiritual beliefs, such as:

• Only my physical body will ever die
• Death is just a new beginning
• I believe in miracles
• Humans possess a soul

Through this survey, Zimbardo wanted to understand whether belief in a life after death alters the way an individual perceives their past, present or future from the previous survey.

Time perspective: Motivation and Emotion

Motivation

Within Psychology, motivation is the process that initiates, directs and sustains goal-directed behaviour and is the driving force of taking action to achieve one's goals (Bandhu et al., 2024). Time perspective theory states that human behaviour is motivated by one's thoughts about the past, present and future. The 5 temporalities influence motivational behaviour differently within the time perspective theory. It was found that future oriented thinking was the most important temporality for goal setting and being motivated to achieve those goals (Seginer & Lens, 2014). It has also been seen that having future time perspective and increasing the instrumentality of present behaviour is positively linked to greater motivation, better learning and performance, and perseverance, especially with specific future goals (Simons et al., 2014).

Future time perspective has also been found to positively relate to intrinsic autonomous motivation, extrinsic controlled motivation, and self-regulation, whereas present fatalistic and past negative temporalities are negatively related to the same (Desmyter & De Raedt, 2012). Moreover, motivation towards, and emotional support for self-fulfilling achievements are positively related to pursuit of the goal, satisfaction in the present, acceptance of the past and to hope for the future (Kashio, 2012).

Figure 5. Different emotions on a human face

Emotion

Emotions are reactions or strong feelings that are experienced as a subjective response to life events. It was found that past positive and future orientation was the most beneficial in harbouring Emotional intelligence, appropriate self-regulation abilities, understanding own and other's emotions, with the relationship between emotions and the time perspective being mediated by various explicit and implicit cognitive processes, such as appraisals and memory (Seginer & Lens, 2014). Although future orientation is associated with greater overall well-being, it can also be related to anxiety, fear and uncertainty about life, which can be detrimental to mental and physical health (Seginer & Lens, 2014). The past positive temporality was found to maintain overall life satisfaction and emotional stability, especially in older adults (Lennings, 2000). Time perspectives have also been found to influence and underpin mood states and could be a potential variable in affecting emotions, though further study into this topic is necessary to confirm this (Suettmann, 2016).

Essentially, future orientation is positively linked to high motivation and high emotional self regulation, whilst past negative and present fatalistic orientations are negatively associated with motivation and self-regulation, demonstrating the importance of future orientation in maintaining well-being and achieving goals (Stanescu & Iorga, 2015), especially in conjunction with the past positive temporality which ensures emotional stability and life satisfaction.

Transcendental future time perspective: Motivation

The future is the temporal domain of motivation and positive expectations, it simultaneously arouses fear and hope, because even though the future is unknown, we have the ability to influence it by achieving our goals and pushing past our boundaries to find something better (Timoszyk-Tomczak & Bugajska, 2019). Research shows, that when time is perceived as open-ended, goals related to knowledge are pursued, and when time is perceived as limited, socioemotional goals are prioritised (Carstensen et al., 1999).

This might explain why the type of goals one desires to achieve change as a human being progresses through their lifespan; young adults possess a drive to succeed in educational institutions or within the workplace, whereas older adults are more focused on maintaining their familial and social bonds, because younger adults are not yet as confronted with the concept of their own mortality as the older adults (Carstensen et al., 1999). Older adults with past positive, present hedonistic, and future orientations were also found to have an increasingly positive outlook on life and death, because of their acceptance of the past and the inevitability of death, as well as a greater focus on the present (Desmyter & De Raedt, 2012).

TFTP, due to its subjectivity, cannot be inferred as being influential, in terms of temporality, on motivational behaviours as it deals with existence and time beyond death or before life. In the context of a transcendental future, of a plane of existence beyond mortality, where the binaries of success and failure do not exist and cannot be quantified by a human measure of achievement, there cannot be a goal left to achieve, no motivational behaviours are required, because it is no longer possible to experience success or failure.

Nevertheless, various religions and spiritual pathways have differing depictions of the afterlife, as such, people can be motivated to achieve the goal of entering their aspirational life after death by adhering to the attitudes and behaviours promoted by their chosen religion in order to facilitate their entry into the afterlife. This is often motivated by death anxiety, and is a form of the Terror management theory, as temporal consciousness, or awareness of the passage of time provides constant reminders of death (Abeyta et al., 2019).

Consequently, this motivates people to avoid reminders of the passing of time, which is often done by structuring time to create a more purposeful progression of it through our lifespan. By engaging in mental time travel to make life meaningful by focusing on internally rewarding experiences from the past or in the future, death anxiety can be assuaged (Abeyta et al., 2019).

Think back to the scenario in Ancient Egypt, when you are aware of the requirements of entering the afterlife - living a good life and being a good person - you would naturally be motivated to commit good deeds in order to keep your heart light enough to pass the test to enter the afterlife, and achieve your goal of reaching your desired life after death.

TFTP on Emotion

As individuals mature into adulthood, they develop the capacity to comprehend the complexities of time, and are able to perceive the past, present and future in more complicated ways. This increased understanding of the passage of time also leads to the arousal of complicated emotions when confronting one's own mortality but it also leads to increased hope for the future, and for the time after death.

Hope is the basis of human existence as it stimulates positive thoughts about the future, encourages the motivation to succeed at a future goal despite obstacles, and it has been found that the higher levels of hope one possesses, the deeper their future thinking orientation, belief in life after death, religiosity, and transcendental future thinking is (Ligocka & Timoszyk-Tomczak, 2019). Future oriented people are more likely to display positive emotional behaviours and are more capable of self-regulating their emotions, which also allows them to see past the present issue and envision a better future event in its stead. The perception of future time allows for more optimism whilst perception and acceptance of the past allows for satisfaction within the life that is being lived.

Surprisingly, studies find that older adults are more optimistic towards life and death but less satisfied with it, whereas younger adults possess a greater satisfaction for life and less optimism for the future (Lennings, 2000). The decrease in satisfaction could possibly result from a deeper understanding of the realities of aging in older adults, however the increase in optimism might be a result of greater present hedonistic tendencies and the comprehension of inevitable death and a possible belief in the afterlife. Whilst the younger adults have a greater satisfaction in their present lives and less optimism for the future potentially due to death anxiety, and the salient reminders of aging with the passage of time, with a possibility of less belief in life after death (Lennings, 2000).

TFTP, on the other hand, is more spiritual and metaphysical, and as such, on a plane of existence that dwells beyond mortal time, it is a lot more open and accepting of all emotional behaviours, which yet again cannot be qualified in human terms as it encompasses the entire spectrum of human emotion and consciousness outside of the physical body and within the realm of time and space. As such, whilst optimism, satisfaction, fears and anxieties regarding the future, present and past remain a part of the human experience, most spiritual and religious doctrines believe that transcendental future time is beyond the concept of emotions entirely and is instead when one is confronted with the enormity of the universe and the subjectivity of the existence of reality itself.

Figure 1. Shanti Devi Case Study A woman named Shanti Devi was born in India on the 11th of December 1926. When she was 5 she began remembering her past life, including her previous life, her death and her rebirth. Many scientists believe this to be impossible, or a figment of a child's overactive imagination. However, if it is possible to travel through past and future memories through our minds, then perhaps, it is not so far off to understand how "reincarnation" occurs. It may not be reincarnation at all, but transcending the boundaries of individual time and looking at what life looked like moments before birth and immediately after death, which could be occurring simultaneously within the same moment to explain reincarnation from one mortal form to the next.

Conclusion

This chapter attempted to understand the complexities of time, the time perspective theory, and the transcendental future time perspective theory. We have recognised that TFTP challenges almost every aspect of our reality, it questions the concept that time is linear by examining the cognitive processes of episodic thinking and mental time travel to the future and into the past, warping time and space within our own consciousness, suggesting that human existence is imperceptibly and inherently part of the concept of time and space. We utilise this ability to structure our own beliefs, emotions and ideas between temporalities in order to better comprehend the passage of time and the inevitability of death. TFTP illustrates the possibility of a life after death or before birth, and the implications of that on the subjectivity of reality itself.

TFTP as a concept is based on philosophy, spirituality, and religious beliefs about afterlives and a time after death. Some religions also believe in reincarnation, which can lead to the idea of being able to mentally travel back to the prenatal past and to the time after death in the same moment of rebirth, and it creates a new paradigm to explore with the potential for transcendental future thinking (Seginer & Lens, 2014).

At the moment, there is very little research being done into the concept of TFTP and its implications on the human psyche. It is, however, almost impossible to empirically research because there is no quantifiable way to observe the perception of transcendental time. None of the current scientific methodologies can holistically study the idea of transcending human consciousness through any existing data collection options and there is no way to create a concrete analysis of such a metaphysical concept. Even though current methodologies cannot study transcendental future thinking, it is still necessary to study people and their beliefs about time after death and why they believe in an afterlife, as well as what they think the afterlife is. It is possible to study people's emotions about realising their own symbolic immortality due to their ability to mentally transcend across time through the past, present and future.

To understand TFTP, it is encouraged to think about your own beliefs about life and death. About time after death and whether you believe in everything that was discussed in the chapter, or whether you believe in death as a final end with nothing beyond it. It is important to critically engage with your own thoughts, emotions, beliefs and motivations for all that you do, say and feel and why you hold those perceptions. Think about your past, your present and envision a future for yourself, how do you fit into the world and why do you see yourself in that way? Future thinking is about allowing yourself to dream the possibilities, and then creating your aims and goals to achieve those dreams.

Thus it is not properly said that there are three times, past, present, and future. Perhaps it might be said rightly that there are three times: a time present of things past; a time present of things present; and a time present of things future. For these three do coexist somehow in the soul, for otherwise I could not see them. The time present of things past is memory; the time present of things present is direct experience; the time present of things future is expectation.

–Augustine, Confessions, Book XI, Chapter XX

Quiz 1 What does the terror management theory posit? people try to avoid death anxiety by structuring a meaningful progression of time people are afraid of continuing to age and try to manage it by not interacting with older people who remind them of the problems of aging a way to create structures around oneself to insulate the individual from mental, emotional or physical harm 2 Which of the following is the most important temporality to have, according to Zimbardo and Boyd's inventory? Present fatalistic Past positive Present hedonistic Future 3 Why is it difficult to narrow down the scope of transcendental future time perspective? because researchers lack the ability to quantifiably measure the process of transcendental future thinking because none of the existing scientific methodologies can properly collect or observe results for a potential experiment all of the other options because it is difficult to comprehend the various possibilities of existence and human consciousness due to the metaphysical nature of this concept

See also

• Episodic memory and planning (Book chapter, 2021)
• Time perspective (Wikiversity)
• Time perspective and happiness (Book chapter, 2016)
• Time perspective and relationships (Book chapter, 2017)

References

Abeyta, A. A., Nelson, T. A., & Routledge, C. (2019). Precious Time. Handbook of Terror Management Theory, 209–225. https://doi.org/10.1016/b978-0-12-811844-3.00008-1

Bandhu, D., Mohan, M. M., Nittala, N. A. P., Jadhav, P., Bhadauria, A., & Saxena, K. K. (2024). Theories of motivation: A comprehensive analysis of human behavior drivers. Acta Psychologica, 244(1), 104177. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actpsy.2024.104177

Carelli, M. G., Wiberg, B., & Wiberg, M. (2011). Development and construct validation of the Swedish Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory. European Journal of Psychological Assessment, 27(4), 220–227. https://doi.org/10.1027/1015-5759/a000076

Carstensen, L. L., Isaacowitz, D. M., & Charles, S. T. (1999). Taking time seriously: A theory of socioemotional selectivity. American Psychologist, 54(3), 165–181. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.54.3.165

Desmyter, F., & De Raedt, R. (2012). The relationship between time perspective and subjective well-being of older adults. Psycologica Belgica, 52(1), 19–38. https://biblio.ugent.be/publication/2109046

Florin Stanescu, D., & Elena Iorga, M. (2015). An Exploratory Study Regarding the Relations between Time Perspective, Achievement Motivation and Self-Regulation. Management Dynamics in the Knowledge Economy, 3(1), 7–24. https://www.ceeol.com/search/article-detail?id=596250

Kashio, M. (2012). Time perspective and motivation in interpersonal contexts. Japanese Psychological Research, 54(3), 297–309. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-5884.2012.00533.x

Keough, K. A., Zimbardo, P. G., & Boyd, J. N. (1999). Who's smoking, drinking, and using drugs? Time perspective as a predictor of substance use. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 21(2), 149–164. https://doi.org/10.1207/15324839951036498

Lennings, C. J. (2000). Optimism, Satisfaction and Time Perspective in the Elderly. The International Journal of Aging and Human Development, 51(3), 167–181. https://doi.org/10.2190/06gk-wher-37xc-btry

Ligocka, M., & Timoszyk-Tomczak, C. (2019). Hope and Time perspective. Socialization & Human Development: International Scientific Journal, 1(1), 25–36. https://doi.org/10.37096/shdisj-19-1.1-0003

Mannino, G., Montefiori, V., Faraci, E., Pillitteri, R., Iacolino, C., Pellerone, M., & Giunta, S. (2017). Subjective Perception of Time: Research Applied on Dynamic Psychology. World Futures, 73(4-5), 285–302. https://doi.org/10.1080/02604027.2017.1333850

Rohr, M. K., John, D. T., Fung, H. H., & Lang, F. R. (2017). A three-component model of future time perspective across adulthood. Psychology and Aging, 32(7), 597–607. https://doi.org/10.1037/pag0000191

Seginer, R., & Lens, W. (2014). The Motivational Properties of Future Time Perspective Future Orientation: Different Approaches, Different Cultures. Springer EBooks, 287–304. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-07368-2_19

Simons, J., Vansteenkiste, M., Lens, W., & Lacante, M. (2004). Placing Motivation and Future Time Perspective Theory in a Temporal Perspective. Educational Psychology Review, 16(2), 121–139. https://doi.org/10.1023/b:edpr.0000026609.94841.2f

Stolarski, M., Fieulaine, N., & Zimbardo, P. G. (2019). Putting Time in a Wider Perspective: The Past, the Present and the Future of Time Perspective Theory. The SAGE Handbook of Personality and Individual Differences: The Science of Personality and Individual Differences, 1, 592–625. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781526451163.n28

Suettmann, M. (2016). Time will tell: time perspective in bipolar disorder. Handle.net. http://hdl.handle.net/1842/20464

Timoszyk-Tomczak, C., & Bugajska, B. (2019). Transcendent and Transcendental Time Perspective Inventory. Frontiers in Psychology, 9. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02677

Tulving, E. (1972). Episodic and semantic memory. In E. Tulving & W. Donaldson, Organization of memory. Academic Press.

Zimbardo, P. G., & Boyd, J. N. (1999). Putting time in perspective: A valid, reliable individual-differences metric. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77(6), 1271–1288. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.77.6.1271

External links

• The psychology of time - TED Talk (Philip Zimbardo)
• Terror Management Theory (Psychology Today)
• Time Perspective Theory - how do you perceive your life? (Andrew Torch)