Time Travel in the Brain: How Hormones Influence Our Perception of Time and Memory

Have you noticed that time flows differently depending on your mental state? It flies when you’re laughing with friends but drags endlessly during a boring lecture. This isn’t just in your imagination, your perception of time is shaped by your body’s chemical signals: hormones.

Take working out on the StairMaster, for example. Your legs are shaking, you’re out of breath, sweat is dripping, and your throat feels like the Sahara Desert. It feels like you’ve been climbing for an hour—yet the screen says 5 minutes. This warped sense of time comes from stress hormones, mainly cortisol and adrenaline, released when your body sees intense exercise as a physical threat.

Cortisol puts your brain on high alert, making you hyper-aware of each second. Adrenaline boosts heart rate, energy, and focus. Together, they enhance performance but also make time feel painfully slow. Your brain even breaks these stressful moments into small, detailed memories—each breath, step, and heartbeat—stretching your sense of time.

While stress hormones can boost short-term performance, too much for too long can harm you. Chronic high cortisol can blur your days together or make tough periods feel endless. This is why maintaining hormonal balance is key for overall well-being.

On the flip side, some hormones make time fly, especially when you’re having fun. Think about hanging out with your best friend, gaming, or working on a hobby. You glance at the clock—three hours have passed without you noticing. This comes from dopamine, your brain’s “reward” chemical, released when you’re enjoying something. Dopamine keeps you focused and emotionally engaged, making you less aware of time ticking by.

Serotonin, another important hormone, works differently. It regulates mood and well-being. When serotonin is balanced, you feel calm and content. In this relaxed state, you’re not counting minutes, you're just present, letting time pass naturally.

Together, dopamine and serotonin pull your attention away from the clock and toward fully experiencing the moment. That’s why, when you’re happy or deeply engaged, time seems to speed up. Time isn’t actually moving faster—your brain is simply too busy enjoying itself to track it.

Unlike a clock, your brain measures time based on perception and experience. Hormones act as its messengers, stretching, compressing, or making you lose track of time entirely. Whether it’s cortisol and adrenaline slowing the minutes during a workout or dopamine and serotonin making hours vanish at a party, our sense of time is constantly shaped by how our body and brain respond to the moment.

Blog Writer: Victoria Maeng