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Abstract Abstract: Although spatio-temporal metaphors are prevalent in different languages and cultures throughout the world，different language speakers may demonstrate their own preferences for the choice of spatio-temporal metaphors. In this study, two experiments were conducted to explore Chinese speakers and English speakers’ preferences of “front/back” spatio-temporal metaphors and their causes. Experiment One showed that Chinese speakers in the implicit task tended to adopt the "time moving" metaphor, while English speakers tended to use the "ego moving" metaphor. Experiment Two adopted 5-point scale and revealed that Chinese native speakers focused more attention on the entities related to the past, while English speakers focused more attention on the entities related to the future. Taken together, the whole research indicates that the Chinese and English speakers’ preferences and mental time orientation conform to the basic hypothesis of “Cultural Account”.
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