PROXEMICS - SPACE

 

Activity:  have two people walk toward each other

Balance of affiliative and privacy needs

Boundary management theory (Petronio)  who is inside the boundary (e.g., family privacy)

Level of privacy regulated by social (attraction, similarities), situational (room size, formality, and personal (age, gender, culture, status) factors

Territory

Fixed space that is claimed and defended (room, chair in class)

Innate need for territory

Behavioral sink experiments with rats

Overcrowding leads to physical and mental health problems

Difference between crowding and density

Crowding is psychological/perceptual

Density is objective (people/space)

Pictures reduce crowding with same density

Types of territory - public, interactional, home, body/personal space

Markers

 

Personal Space - not fixed, bubble around you, changes with situation

People influences

men occupy more space, mixed-sex dyads closest for heterosexuals

age  closer to peers

status  further from higher status people (homes - distance from street)

attraction  closest to people you like