Reading Time: 5 minutes
From repeatedly asking “Are we there yet?” to wondering where time has gone, this shift reflects a fundamental change in our perception of time. Rather than time itself changing, it is the way our minds process experiences that transforms how time is felt. The experience of time is shaped by how we attend to and remember events, rather than by any objective difference in duration. As our daily lives become more routine and our attention more fragmented, our brains encode fewer distinct details, creating the illusion that time is moving faster. Furthermore, age related changes in cognitive processes such as attention and working memory influence how experiences are processed and remembered. In this sense, time is not something we measure, but something we create.
When Time Feels Endless: Time Perception in Childhood
In childhood, time is often experienced as slower and more extended, with even short periods feeling unusually long. Moments such as waiting during a car ride can feel almost endless, not because time itself changes but due to developmental differences in attention, experience, and cognitive processing. With their limited prior life experience, children rely mostly on the present moment, directing their attention toward ongoing sensory input. As many everyday situations are still new to them, they are more likely to perceive these experiences as novel, allowing unfamiliar stimuli to capture and sustain their attention. However, when a situation lacks stimulation, such as standing in a queue, their attention is subconsciously shifted toward time itself, often leading to boredom and making time feel slower. This sensitivity to novelty is supported by dopaminergic mechanisms in the brain, which enhance attention and strengthen memory encoding in response to new stimuli. In addition, time perception in childhood is influenced by a proportional effect, where duration is experienced relative to one’s lived experience. This becomes particularly evident when considering longer time intervals. For a young child, a single year represents a major proportion of life, making waiting for events such as a birthday feel longer than it does in adulthood, illustrating how the same objective duration is extended by the childhood mind.
When Time Begins to Feel Faster
Have you ever found yourself saying, “Time just flew by”? This is not something you would typically hear from a child, and this contrast reflects a deeper shift in how time is experienced across the lifespan. You may notice using this expression on different occasions in your life, whether when coming across an old photograph or realizing how much someone you have known since childhood has grown. This tendency is widely recognized in neuroscience as a universal human experience, reflecting a common tendency for time to feel as though it moves faster with age. This is not due to any change in time itself, but rather reflects how the brain processes experiences differently over time. During childhood, many experiences are new and encoded in memory, creating a detailed record of events. In contrast, adulthood is often characterized by routine. As daily life becomes more repetitive, fewer novel experiences are encoded, resulting in fewer distinct memories. Additionally, age-related changes in cognitive processes such as attention and working memory may further influence how experiences are processed. As attention becomes less focused on the present moment, experiences are encoded with less detail. Research by Ruth Ogden (2020) supports this view, showing that the way individuals structure their daily activities and direct their attention can significantly influence how time is experienced. Her findings suggest that when daily life becomes more repetitive or less engaging, time is more likely to feel distorted. For example, during a typical school day filled with lectures, where attention shifts between tasks, experiences are not fully encoded. Therefore, even if the day is filled with tasks, it may feel as though it passed quickly when looking back on it.
When Moments Pass Quickly but Stay Longer
Some moments feel like they slip through our fingers, but expand when we look back on them.This phenomenon is often described in everyday language as the “holiday paradox,” where time seems to pass quickly during enjoyable experiences such as a vacation, yet later feels longer in memory.Psychological research explains this more precisely by distinguishing between prospective and retrospective time perception.When we are engaged in an experience, particularly one that is novel or stimulating, our attention is directed toward the activity itself rather than the flow of time, which makes time feel as though it is passing faster. In contrast, when we reflect on that same period, what shapes how long it feels is how much we remember from it. A vacation, for example, often involves a variety of new places and experiences, each leaving behind distinct memories that act as markers, making the period seem longer when we look back on it. This can be explained by retrospective time perception, where duration is defined by how many events we recall and how varied they are, rather than how much time has actually passed.
Conclusion The way people perceive time varies in systematic and meaningful ways across their lives. Both time perception and memory are influenced by changes in attention, novelty, as well as in cognitive processes. While childhood is defined by focused attention and frequent novelty, adulthood is marked by greater routine and more fragmented attention, resulting in fewer distinct memories. Furthermore, the difference between prospective and retrospective time perception shows that the same period might feel faster while it is happening but longer when it is remembered. Taken together, time is shaped not by the calendar, but by how it is lived.
Selin Palti
Bibliography
Ogden, R. S. (2020). The passage of time during the UK COVID-19 lockdown. PLOS ONE,15(7), e0235871.
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0235871
Wittmann, M., & Lehnhoff, S. (2016). Age effects in perception of time. Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, 8, 102.
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/aging-neuroscience/articles/10.3389/fnagi.2016.00102/full
Hancock, P. A., & Rausch, M. (2024). Time in a bottle: A psychophysics study of human time perception through aging.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/385701350
Sanz-Gómez, S., et al. (2024). [Article on time perception and affective processes]. Journal of Affective Disorders.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0001691824003378
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