Abstract
Naming digital clocks (e.g., 2:45, say "quarter to three") requires conceptual operations on the minute and hour information displayed in the input for producing the correct relative time expression. The interplay of these conceptual operations was investigated using a repetition priming paradigm. Participants named analog clocks (the primes) directly before naming digital clocks (the targets). The targets referred to the hour (e.g., 2:00), half past the hour (e.g., 2:30), or the next full hour (e.g., 2:45). The primes displayed times that were one or two hours and five or ten minutes later than targets. Digital clock naming latencies were shorter with a five- than with a ten-minute difference between prime and target, but the difference in hour had no effect. Moreover, the distance in minutes had only an effect for half past the hour and the next full hour, but not for the hour. These findings suggest that conceptual facilitation occurs when conceptual transformations are shared between prime and target in telling time.
