Personal space

  Measuring personal space in the class was very interesting for me. Each of us preferred different distance from one another. Some preferred to be close to the other and some far away. During that measurement we realized that unconsciously we change the distance  related to the height and size of a person that we are talking to.

  When we were talking about personal and social or public space in the class I was comparing the definition of personal space in my country with American people’s. About a month ago when I came to the US the first thing that was really weird for me was people’s behavior in public places. People stand  far apart from each other in the line in a shop or bank. Whereas in my country people stand  more closer to each other and they easily start friendly conversation with strangers. I think it may not happen here, because people  here always keep their distances with strangers. 
  So personal distance will be affected by so many factors like personality, culture, gender and some other factors which make it hard to give universal definition for it.

                                           Fig 1. Personal space

   I realized  American people’s expectation of personal space can vary largely from place to place. For example, my friends and I went to a bar last weekend and we were sitting around the table next to a window, the bar gradually became crowded. When I was talking with my friends I realized that the guy near my seat rested his hand on  my chair and it made me so uncomfortable or the waiter got very close to talk to us. In my country people keep somehow the same distance in all public places but here people show different behavior related to the setting.

   The other interesting thing that I came up with in an article was that people’s personal space not only can be different in size but also can be vary in shape. Some  may prefer to be far when they see the face of another but not be very far when people are behind them. They may not be very sensitive to have a far distance from people beside them.

  In spite of all the  differences the idea that we all carry a kind of invisible form around ourselves which is called personal space is really intriguing. 

                                          Fig 2. Shaping personal space



References

Fig 1. Retrieved from http://www.dirjournal.com/info/space-this-time-its-personal/

Fig 2. Retrieved from http://www.harbourfrontcentre.com/visualarts/architecture_
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