The Definitive Book of Body Language - Barbara Pease [69]
An exception to this rule is the spacing that occurs in public toilet blocks. We found that people choose the end toilets about 90 percent of the time and, if they are occupied, the midway principle is used. Men always try to avoid standing beside strangers at a public urinal and always obey the unwritten law of “Death before eye contact.”
Try the Luncheon Test
Try this simple test next time you eat with someone. Unspoken territorial rules state that a restaurant table is divided equally down the middle and the staff carefully place the salt, pepper, sugar, flowers, and other accessories equally on the center line. As the meal progresses, subtly move the salt cellar across to the other person's side, then the pepper, flowers, and so on. Before long, this subtle territorial invasion will cause a reaction in your lunchmate. They either sit back to regain their space or start pushing everything back to the center.
Cultural Factors Affecting Zone Distances
A young Italian couple migrated from Italy to live in Sydney, Australia, and were invited to join a local social club. Several weeks after joining, three female members complained that the Italian man was making sexual advances toward them and that they felt uncomfortable around him. The male members of the club felt that the Italian woman had also been behaving as if she could be sexually available.
This situation illustrates the complications that can happen when cultures with different space needs come together. Many Southern Europeans have an intimate distance of only eight to eleven inches and in some places it's even less. The Italian couple felt at ease and relaxed when standing at a distance of ten inches from the Australians, but were totally unaware of their intrusion into the Australians' eighteen-inch Intimate Zone. Italian people also use more eye contact and touch than Australians, which gave rise to further misjudgments about their motives. The Italians were shocked when this was pointed out to them, but they resolved to practice standing back at a more culturally accepted distance.
Moving into the Intimate Zone of the opposite sex is a way of showing interest in that person and is commonly called an “advance.” If the advance into the Intimate Zone is rejected, the other person will step backward to reclaim their space. If the advance is accepted, the other person holds his ground and allows the intruder to remain. To measure a man's level of interest in her, a woman will step into his Intimate Zone and then step back out again. If he's interested, this cues him to step into her space whenever he makes a point.
The closer people feel emotionally to each other,
the closer they will stand to each other.
What seemed to the Italian couple to be a perfectly normal social encounter was being interpreted by the Australians as a sexual advance. The Italians thought the Australians were being cold and unfriendly because they kept moving away from the Italians to keep a comfortable distance.
The acceptable conversational distance for most Western, Northern European, and Scandinavian city dwellers
A man with a smaller spatial need forcing a woman to lean back to defend her space
The previous illustration shows the negative reaction of a woman on whose territory a man is encroaching. She leans backward, attempting to keep a comfortable distance. However, the man may be from a culture with a smaller Personal Zone and he is moving forward to a distance that is comfortable for him. The woman may interpret this as a sexual move.
Why Japanese Always Lead When They Waltz
At our international conferences, city-born Americans usually stand eighteen to forty-eight inches from each other and stand in the same place while talking. If you watch a Japanese and an American talking, the two will slowly begin to move around the room, the American moving backward away from the Japanese and the Japanese moving forward. This is an attempt by both the American and Japanese to adjust to a culturally comfortable distance