Time

This entry describes the development of the ability to process and represent information about time. Adaptive behavior depends heavily on sensitivity to information about time. There is a wide variety of different types of such information, including information about how long the events last, the relative order in which events happen, and whether events are in the past, present, or future. Use of such information underpins numerous skills that are crucial in development from low-level skills such as motor behavior to high-level cognitive abilities. Timing one’s actions appropriately, remembering sequences of events, reliably predicting what is going to happen next, and planning for the future all depend on processing different types of information about time. Some concept of time is required in language learning: Learning ...