We compared the extent to which people discounted positive and negative events in the future and in the past. We found that the tendency to discount gains more than losses (i.e., the sign effect) emerged more strongly for future than for past outcomes. We present evidence from six studies (total N = 1,077) that the effect of tense on discounting is tied to differences in the contemplation emotion of these events, which we assessed by measuring participants’ emotions while they either anticipated or remembered the event. We ruled out loss aversion, uncertainty, utility curvature, thought frequency, and connection to the future and past self as explanations for this phenomenon, and we discuss why people experience a distinct mixture of emotions when contemplating upcoming events.

中文翻译：

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过去和未来贴现中的符号效应

我们比较了人们对未来和过去积极和消极事件的低估程度。我们发现，与过去的结果相比，未来的收益比损失更容易贴现（即符号效应）。我们提供了来自六项研究（总 N = 1,077）的证据，表明时态对折扣的影响与这些事件的沉思情绪的差异有关，我们通过测量参与者在预期或记住事件时的情绪来评估这些差异。我们排除了损失厌恶、不确定性、效用曲率、思维频率以及与未来和过去自我的联系作为对这种现象的解释，我们讨论了为什么人们在考虑即将发生的事件时会体验到明显的情绪混合。