{"title":"Time perspective and helpfulness: Are communicators more persuasive in the past, present, or future tense?","authors":"David Fang , Sam J. Maglio","doi":"10.1016/j.jesp.2023.104544","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>When people share their experiences, they can communicate seemingly identical information from different time perspectives. Time perspective manifests in words—specifically, verbs in the past tense (e.g., “the experience <em>was</em> great”), the present tense (e.g., “the experience <em>is</em> great”), or the future tense (e.g., “the experience <em>will be</em> great”). This research considers whether this linguistic shift in time perspective impacts how others interpret the message. Two naturalistic studies (sourcing over 2 million Amazon reviews) and three pre-registered lab experiments (<em>N</em><span> = 1259) find that reviews written in the present tense (relative to the past or future tense) receive higher helpfulness ratings through a process of heightened concrete construal<span>. Implications at the intersection of communication, psycholinguistics, and persuasion are discussed.</span></span></p></div>","PeriodicalId":48441,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Experimental Social Psychology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.2000,"publicationDate":"2023-09-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journal of Experimental Social Psychology","FirstCategoryId":"102","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103123001014","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"PSYCHOLOGY, SOCIAL","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
When people share their experiences, they can communicate seemingly identical information from different time perspectives. Time perspective manifests in words—specifically, verbs in the past tense (e.g., “the experience was great”), the present tense (e.g., “the experience is great”), or the future tense (e.g., “the experience will be great”). This research considers whether this linguistic shift in time perspective impacts how others interpret the message. Two naturalistic studies (sourcing over 2 million Amazon reviews) and three pre-registered lab experiments (N = 1259) find that reviews written in the present tense (relative to the past or future tense) receive higher helpfulness ratings through a process of heightened concrete construal. Implications at the intersection of communication, psycholinguistics, and persuasion are discussed.
期刊介绍:
The Journal of Experimental Social Psychology publishes original research and theory on human social behavior and related phenomena. The journal emphasizes empirical, conceptually based research that advances an understanding of important social psychological processes. The journal also publishes literature reviews, theoretical analyses, and methodological comments.