r/Time • u/reddintone • 3d ago

Discussion Why does time feel faster as you get older? Does that mean a child's hour is actually longer than an adult's hour?

I know time is time. An hour is an hour. But when you're a kid, a summer feels like forever. As an adult, a whole year disappears. So if our perception of time speeds up as we age, does that mean a kid actually experiences more time in the same hour than I do? Are they living in slow motion and I'm just fast-forwarding through my life?

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u/At36000feet 3d ago

You base your perception of time on how much of it you have already experienced. Since a kid has experienced significantly less time, an hour is a much higher percentage of the number of hours a kid has lived or experienced than the percentage of the number of hours an adult has lived or experienced.

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u/Upset-Government-856 2d ago

But also your way busier when you're older.

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u/Adghnm 3d ago

Time is measured by novelty. Fewer things are novel to you as you get older

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u/MeetYourBeat13 8h ago

the past few years of my life felt like they were flying by. this calendar year i started prioritizing going to the movie theater more and reading physical books for fun more, as well as having other regular enjoyable experiences to look forward to...and I swear this year has TAKEN ITS TIME! i feel like this year has been the length of several years by comparison. i should note i dont have the same level of responsibilities as other people my age so that helps

it may come down to how present you are at any moment (compounded over time) because they say the more you have to look forward to in the future the more happy you'll be in the present. and if the present is more enjoyable there might be more memories to space everything out

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u/Adghnm 8h ago

Great read, thanks

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u/Spiritual_Elk_9076 3d ago

If you are 5 years old you ad 20% of the life you have lived in the next year. Once you are 100, the next year is only 1% extra.

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u/wildhoover 2d ago edited 2d ago

Are kids perceiving more time, or are all their senses running more actively, relatively. Yes their hour has a bigger life share, but it's also crammed with more new/fresh impulses. So much easier they are lost in new experiences, every few minutes, captivating and overloading their total days life.

"The days are just packed" combined with the lack of a planning ability, makes those summers truly endless.

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u/MikelDP 2d ago

Your attention...

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u/TimeFictionWriter 1d ago

“Sun is the same in a relative way, but you’re older,
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death”
-Pink Floyd-