Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

Prominent theories suggest that time and number arerepresented by a common magnitude system. However,distinct patterns of temporal and numerical processingoccur in the presence of emotional stimuli, calling intoquestion theories of a common magnitude system, whilealso unveiling questions regarding the mechanismsunderlying these temporal and numerical biases. Wetested whether numerical processing, like temporalprocessing, may be impacted by increased arousal levels,yet have a higher threshold level in order to impactestimates. If so, then induced arousal may reverse thetypical pattern of numerical underestimation in thepresence of emotions. Adults (N = 85) participated ineither a stress-induction or a control version of the task.Then, participants completed a numerical bisection task inthe presence and absence of emotional content. Increasingarousal had no impact on numerical processing, except inthe presence of happy faces, providing further evidencefor distinct processing mechanisms.