ABSTRACT
This chapter reports the results of a series of experiments examining the potential psychological link between spatial and temporal prospects, specifically between variations in the degree of foreground obstruction and the spatial depth of external window views and an observer’s sense of connection to the future. It was found that external views from indoor spaces were strongly associated with a sense of the future, that partially obstructing such a view significantly reduced that association, and that replacing a real view with a pictorial representation removed most of its association with the future. The English word “prospect” encapsulates the overlapping of the spatial and temporal. It originated in classical times as a purely spatial term meaning view or “look forward,” but in the sixteenth century took on the additional temporal implication of an imagined future.
