This paper explores the link between the metaphoric structure TIME IS SPACE and time perception in bilinguals. While there appear to be fundamental commonalities in the way humans perceive and experience time regardless of language background, language-specific spatiotemporal metaphors can give rise to differences between populations, under certain conditions. Little is known, however, about how bilinguals experience time, and the specific factors that may modulate bilingual temporal processing. Here, we address this gap by examining L1 Spanish – L2 Swedish bilinguals in a psychophysical task. Results show that duration estimation of dynamic spatial configurations analogous to L2-specific temporal metaphors is modulated by L2 proficiency. In contrast, duration estimation of spatial configurations analogous to the L1 metaphorical expressions appears to be modulated by the age of L2 acquisition. These findings are discussed in terms of associative learning and cognitive restructuring in the bilingual mind.

本文探讨了双语者的隐喻结构“时间就是空间”与时间感知之间的联系。尽管无论语言背景如何，人类感知和体验时间的方式似乎都存在基本共性，但特定语言的时空隐喻在某些条件下可能会导致人群之间的差异。然而，人们对双语者如何体验时间以及可能调节双语时间处理的具体因素知之甚少。在这里，我们通过在心理物理学任务中检查 L1 西班牙语 - L2 瑞典语双语者来解决这一差距。结果表明，类似于 L2 特定时间隐喻的动态空间配置的持续时间估计受到 L2 熟练程度的调节。相比之下，与 L1 隐喻表达类似的空间配置的持续时间估计似乎受到 L2 习得年龄的调节。这些发现是从双语思维中的联想学习和认知重组的角度进行讨论的。