Time Passage & Bias

Most people are familiar with the perception that time can drag or speed up depending upon the activity. Studies suggest this has to do with whether a routine is involved. For example, traveling a familiar route and routine work activities, tend to speed up one’s perception of time. Many people tend to underestimate how long it takes to travel a familiar route. The last few days of a ten-day vacation may seem to go by faster because some type of routine often sets in. Waiting for a special anticipated event that is unique and out of the ordinary, may feel like forever. The other parts of one’s life—often filled with more routine and predictable events—may seem to slip by much more quickly that it did in one’s earlier years. “Would summer vacation NEVER come?” As one person put it, the roads of our lives become well-worn and consequently we take less notice of the landscape.