Does language shape political attitudes?

This study examines how linguistic differences influence temporal perspective. Futureless languages (e.g., Estonian) don't grammatically distinguish present and future tense, while others do (e.g., Russian). We hypothesize that this forces speakers to mentally conflate "today" with "tomorrow." By making the future seem closer, it reduces time discounting.

This results in greater support for future-oriented policies. Using original survey experiments on Estonian-Russian bilinguals and cross-national surveys confirms our theory: explicit temporal markers lead to stronger policy preferences. No effect is seen when no obvious timeframe exists.

Methodologically robust findings with implications across political science, linguistics, and psychology.