Temporal Frame of Reference

This subject refers to people's frame of reference as a result of their sense and use of time in human communication. Our concerns are: How is time conceived, organized, used, and interpreted in different cultures? How do people conceptualize and use time in human communication?

To address these issues, let us begin with a discussion on the two basic types of time, namely, biological time, mechanical time, psychological time, and social time.

Four Types of Time

Biological time refers to the temporal dimensions of the natural world, such as the four seasons and the corresponding growth and decay of matters, sun rise and sun set, or aging that we all experience as a matter of course.

Mechanical time is time measured by mechanical devices such as the clock and the likes. In essence, this is the artificial measurement of biological time, which, before the advent of the clock or similar "time keeping devices," was not measured in centuries, years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, and seconds. According to biological time, people live and die and they do not live this or that number of "years" or die at a certain "age." This is an important concept to know because, according to prevalent theories, the existence and use of mechanical time define how things are being done in society and, equally importantly, how people organize and interact among themselves. Lewis Mumford, for example, argued in his 1934 classic, Technics and Civilization, that the invention and introduction of the mechanical clock set up the temporal context for the rise of industrialization in the Western world.
With the clock, time can be measured mechanically and in discrete units. As such, time can be "managed," "saved," "lost," or "wasted." In industrial terms, time is often equated to productivity and therefore wealth ("Time is money."). Therefore, people born and raised in industrialized societies have tended to have a more mechanical conception of time than people in less industrialized societies, such as in agricultural societies. A simple example will clarify this point. Young infants do things according to their innate biological time because they do not have first-hand experience with mechanical time. In other words, they have not internalized mechanical time yet. So they cry (for food) whenever they "feel" hungry. Meanwhile, those of us who have thoroughly internalized mechanical often "think" we should have lunch at a certain hour (say, 12:00 noon) even though we are not hungry yet. This is one reason why small children, who have not accustomed to the mechanical use of time, have eating habits that are different from adults as far as their "timing" is concerned.

The third type of time is psychological time, which refers to the sense of time experienced by individuals. Psychological time is the result of a complex set of factors that contribute to the mental frame of reference of the individuals. In other words, we should not be surprised to find that people have different psychological time. People with what is considered "quick temper" have tended to have a more rapid sense of psychological time than those who are not, for example. You can in fact do an informal experiment to find out how your friends may differ in their psychological time. When you are with your friends, ask them to do the followings: close their eyes and then open their eyes when two minutes are up. Meanwhile, you use a silent stop watch to mark the time it takes for each of your friends to open his or her eyes. At the end of the experiment, you will be amused by the difference among your friends' psychological times.

Social time refers to the temporal frame of reference that is socially defined in regard to what is proper or improper use of time in social interaction. Social time is partly the result of the extent to which the culture in question has internalized mechanical time. Of course, "social time" on this level is used as a general reference. Since society by and large is made up of many sub-groups, it is conceivable that social times maintained by these sub-groups may differ among themselves. However, it is generally understood that, comparatively, people in industrialized cultures have tended to maintain a social time more regimented than their counterparts in less-industrialized cultures where people have a relatively less mechanical and more fluid sense of time. For instance, when American corporate executives set up an appointment with their business associates at, say, one in the afternoon, they more or less expect their appointment to show up at the meeting place within the 10 to 15 minutes after 1 p.m. But people in Latin America seem to have a set of social-temporal frame of reference that is much more "flexible" than the North American counterparts. As a result, we often hear funny stories about unapologetic local business associates in Latin American countries feeling puzzled by the frustration on the part of his North American counterparts over the fact that the former were "late" by an hour or so.

Another set of concepts can also be helpful in our understanding of people's temporal frame of reference. They are known as polychronic time and monochronic time.


Polychronic Time and Monochronic Time

Polychronic time and monochronic time are two different "management styles" of time. Polychronic time refers to a style of "time management" that does not emphasize on the adherence to preset schedule. Instead, according to Edward T., Hall, polychronic time stresses involvement of people and completion of transaction rather than following a schedule. In such a polychronic context, appointment are not taken very seriously and they in fact are often broken. Meanwhile, people conduct their business polychronically may do multiple tasks at the same time; they do not do thing "sequentially," that is, finish one task before moving on to the next. They express more on the process of performing their task that finishing their task on time. They tend to be more intuitive and less mechanical in their use of time. 

In the monochronic mode, however, time is conceived and understood as discrete units of measurement (as in the world defined by the mechanical clock). People living in an industrialized social environment have tended to be monochronic in the ways they manage time. They tend to execute tasks in a sequential manner; they will not move on to another job unless they complete what they have on their desk. In fact, "time management" experts often consult their corporate clients to adopt the monochronic model to enhance the latter's productivity. A vivid illustration is how works are broken up and structured on the typical assembly lines in a linear, monochronic manner (e.g., auto factories). To a great extent, monochronic time emphasizes on the completion of tasks according to preset schedule. Monochronic time embodies a linear orientation of time.

How individuals conceptualize and use time is a subtle business, one that cannot be detected easily. However, we hope the above concepts can give you a useful framework to identify your counterparts' temporal frame of reference. We also hope these ideas can help you understand yourself not only in how you have been managing your time but also in how your own temporal frame of reference may have defined the ways in which you relate to others and come to understand the world around you.