Calendar synesthesia

Also called time-space synesthesia

A type of spatial sequence synesthesia

(Image: The months, by Caffeinding, on Reddit/Synesthesia. “I typically see it facing from the left (autumn). The blue rectangle at the top is January and the months go clockwise from there.”)

In this type of synesthesia, the synesthete has a visual perception of time units such as days, months, hours, years, decades or centuries, seen in the space surrounding or in front of them. Projector synesthetes – a minority – can see their time sequences literally in external space when they think of them, while associator synesthetes perceive them in the mind’s eye but not physically.

(Image: The calendar, by Gingerale947 in this post on Reddit/Synesthesia. 2017.)

The spatial positioning of the elements is highly consistent and tends not to vary throughout the synesthete’s lifetime, the only change tending to occur with this kind of maps is that the years and decades can sometimes be extended to “add” time units that were originally considered to be in the distant future and were not yet clearly seen. The time units often also have their own shape, texture and/or colour. The days, months, etc. are habitually seen from the perspective of the time unit in question, so in January, for example, the synesthete may feel as if they are standing in front of January and that February is behind, below or beside it, but on the 1st of February the perspective changes so that January shifts over to a neighbouring position or even to the “back of the queue”.

(Image: The time of day, by Stacy in the Gallery in Sensequence.de)

Synesthetic calendars are totally idiosyncratic and take multiple forms: there seem to be as many of them as there are people with this type of synesthesia. Some of the most common arrangements are rings, spirals, ladders, lines with curves or sharp bends, endless loops… although the exact forms are probably all unique. 

(Images: Left: Years, by Brad Pettengill, in his blog. Right: Decades and centuries, by Kerry in the Gallery in Sensequence.de.)

Having this kind of synesthesia often helps the synesthete recall dates and times and some say they have no need for planners or agendas.

(Image: The days of the week, by Barbara in the Gallery in Sensequence.de)

Time-space synesthesia is one of the more common types, and it is interesting to note that this same phenomenon or something very similar is often found in non-synesthetes, i.e. people who do not have any other types and do not seem to share the same neurocognitive profile as the synesthete population. There is more information about the manifestations of spatial sequencing among synesthetes and non-synesthetes on the page on Spatial sequence synesthesia, and these two scientific studies might be interesting to read or consult if you are interested in this aspect:

What is the relationship between synaesthesia andvisuo-spatial number forms? (Noam Sagiv, Julia Simner, James Collins, Brian Butterworth and Jamie Ward, University College London and University of Edinburgh, UK, 2005).

The objectification of overlearned sequences: A new view of spatial sequence synesthesia (D. Eagleman, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas, USA, 2009).

(Image: Historical eras, by Geo Morgan, posted in the Facebook group Synesthesia. 2020.)

Image: The decades, by Rebecca Schulz Kluchnyk, posted to the Facebook group Synesthesia. 2020.)

Here is a description written by someone with this type of synesthesia:

“I can see timelines dating back to the 1500s. Things get muddled in between, but the basic "pattern" or "track" is there. It's always there. And it's not in a straight line. It never is. There are so many curves that there's no way for me to actually map it out and make it make sense to anyone who looks at it. If I were to go into detail on how I view individual months and days within the months, I'd have to have a large poster board to do it, as it gets very detailed. Same goes for hours of the day. Days of the week are an oval, but each day has their own hours detailed. The only day that has a slightly different pattern with the hours is Sunday. It's strange how I see time on a scale, on a map. They're not just numbers. They're alive.”

(Source: This post on Reddit/Synesthesia. 2020.)

Does calendar synesthesia help with memory?

It appears that calendar synesthesia is often useful for recalling dates and the process of accurately pinpointing autobiographical experiences (or historical events) in time. Some people with this type of synesthesia say that they have no need for a physical calendar because they carry their own personal calendar around with them in their mind or vision and can “consult” it at will. This person describes how their synesthetic time mapping helps them with memory recall:

“Does anyone else know the month or even precise day in which they saw movies at the theater, or on Netflix, etc. on their mental calendar of different years? I can, because I literally see them in my monthly calendar for different years. And others, I can just state the year.

I listen to a lot of songs on Spotify (…). I have a tendency to heavily place them on my monthly calendar of different years depending on when I listened to them. I can list a ton of songs that I listened to in the month+year across the span of many years. As I mentally go through different months of different years, I see a bunch of songs I listened to during those times. (…)

I also tend to heavily place photos/videos on my monthly calendar. If I think of a specific month in a certain year, I will automatically think of photos/videos from that time. And similar to when one is scrolling through their photos, as I mentally move through different months of different years, I get flooded with images I took from those times. As a result, I know what events happened before or after what, as I literally see the order.”

(Source: this post on Reddit/Synesthesia. 2022.)

 

An article

Here is an excellent general article on Calendar synesthesia written by Katie Spalding for the IFLSCIENCE online magazine.

Can I test it?

You might want to test your calendar synesthesia, just for fun or to see if you have it (contributing to scientific research at the same time). There is a section where you can do this in the Synesthesia Battery Test.

Go to the page on spatial sequence synesthesia in general

This page last updated: 8 April 2024