Dynamic Adjustment of Interpersonal Distance in Cooperative Task

Abstract

This paper presented an empirical study which investigated a dynamic adjustment of interpersonal distance in a cooperative situation. In the experiment, three factors of the “task”, “orientation”, and “gender combination” were emphasized. Ninety-six data of interpersonal distances were obtained under four different conditions from twenty-four participants.

First, ANOVA and multiple comparisons revealed that the factors of the “task”, “orientation”, and “gender combination” had statistically significant influences on the adjustment of interpersonal distance. In particular, the results indicated that (1) preferred interpersonal distances were shortened when a dyad initiated a “cooperative task”, (2) preferred interpersonal distance of “side-by-side” was shorter than “face-to-face”, and (3) interpersonal distance of “female-female” pair was shorter than “male-male” pair and it was also shorter than “heterogeneous gender” pair.

Furthermore, correlation analyses, under “face-to-face” condition, revealed that, (1) evaluators who had longer interpersonal distances of “no task” shortened larger amount of their interpersonal distances when a dyad initiated a cooperation, and more interestingly, (2) a larger divergence of preferred interpersonal distances of “no task” condition among each dyad derived a larger amount of shortening of interpersonal distance when a dyad initiated a cooperation. The result also suggested that interpersonal distance of an evaluator and an approacher had a significant correlation under “cooperative task” condition.

Finally, beyond a self-centered view of personal space, this paper suggested an interesting view of phenomenon of adjusting interpersonal distance, from a dynamic interactive process of an evaluator and a confederate. An implication to the design of spatial behavior of social assistive robots was also discussed.