On Feeling Negative past as a Part of Current Self: Subjective Temporal Organization of Autobiographical Memories

Abstract

When a past event is remembered, the subjective elapsed time is often different from the objective elapsed time, even if the exact date of an event is known. In this study, Feeling of Time Discrepancy between objective elapsed time and subjective elapsed time of turning point events was examined. Participants remembered one turning point event in life, dated the event, and estimated the Feeling of Time Discrepancy. Two groups, formed on their judgement of whether their present understanding of the event is the same or different from understanding when the event occurred (the Same assessment group and the Different assessment group). Analysis showed the Different assessment group felt the turning point event to be more recent than the Same assessment group did, although there was no difference between actual elapsed time and memory vividness for the two groups. In addition, the events which changed from negative to positive were felt subjectively to be more recent than those for which affect was consistently positive. These results suggest that, even if we experience negative events, the event might become a part of the present self and be felt temporally closer to now, when temporal organization of autobiographical memories allow recognition of the event as good experience. Finally, two types of temporal organization of such memory were discussed, the subjective temporal organization of autobiographical memory which is organized only for oneself and the social objective temporal organization of autobiographical memory which becomes organized in sharing it with another person.