TempViz: On the Evaluation of Temporal Knowledge in Text-to-Image Models

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Auteurs principaux: Holtermann, Carolin, Krebs, Nina, Lauscher, Anne
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2026
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author Holtermann, Carolin
Krebs, Nina
Lauscher, Anne
author_facet Holtermann, Carolin
Krebs, Nina
Lauscher, Anne
contents Time alters the visual appearance of entities in our world, like objects, places, and animals. Thus, for accurately generating contextually-relevant images, knowledge and reasoning about time can be crucial (e.g., for generating a landscape in spring vs. in winter). Yet, although substantial work exists on understanding and improving temporal knowledge in natural language processing, research on how temporal phenomena appear and are handled in text-to-image (T2I) models remains scarce. We address this gap with TempViz, the first data set to holistically evaluate temporal knowledge in image generation, consisting of 7.9k prompts and more than 600 reference images. Using TempViz, we study the capabilities of five T2I models across five temporal knowledge categories. Human evaluation shows that temporal competence is generally weak, with no model exceeding 75% accuracy across categories. Towards larger-scale studies, we also examine automated evaluation methods, comparing several established approaches against human judgments. However, none of these approaches provides a reliable assessment of temporal cues - further indicating the pressing need for future research on temporal knowledge in T2I.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2601_14951
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle TempViz: On the Evaluation of Temporal Knowledge in Text-to-Image Models
Holtermann, Carolin
Krebs, Nina
Lauscher, Anne
Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Artificial Intelligence
Computation and Language
Time alters the visual appearance of entities in our world, like objects, places, and animals. Thus, for accurately generating contextually-relevant images, knowledge and reasoning about time can be crucial (e.g., for generating a landscape in spring vs. in winter). Yet, although substantial work exists on understanding and improving temporal knowledge in natural language processing, research on how temporal phenomena appear and are handled in text-to-image (T2I) models remains scarce. We address this gap with TempViz, the first data set to holistically evaluate temporal knowledge in image generation, consisting of 7.9k prompts and more than 600 reference images. Using TempViz, we study the capabilities of five T2I models across five temporal knowledge categories. Human evaluation shows that temporal competence is generally weak, with no model exceeding 75% accuracy across categories. Towards larger-scale studies, we also examine automated evaluation methods, comparing several established approaches against human judgments. However, none of these approaches provides a reliable assessment of temporal cues - further indicating the pressing need for future research on temporal knowledge in T2I.
title TempViz: On the Evaluation of Temporal Knowledge in Text-to-Image Models
topic Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Artificial Intelligence
Computation and Language
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.14951