Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works. Hey, brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: it's Christian Seger here. If you like to stand close
Speaker 1: to folks when you talk to them, you'll love Argentina.
Speaker 1: The South American country is filled with close talkers, people
Speaker 1: who stand two point five feet or point seven six
Speaker 1: meters away from strangers when they're chatting. But if you
Speaker 1: prefer more personal space, make your way to Romania instead.
Speaker 1: Their residents like to stand a spacious four point five
Speaker 1: feet or one point four meters away from strangers. This
Speaker 1: info on personal bubbles comes from a study of preferred
Speaker 1: interpersonal distances recently published in the Journal of Cross Cultural Psychology.
Speaker 1: While this issue of personal space in different countries has
Speaker 1: been examined before, the authors of this study used a
Speaker 1: much larger data set than was used in previous studies,
Speaker 1: nearly nine thousand people living in forty two countries. Participants
Speaker 1: were shown a picture with two figures representing two people
Speaker 1: and a line with some distances marked off in between them.
Speaker 1: The subjects were asked how close should the two figures
Speaker 1: stand together if they are strangers versus close friends, versus
Speaker 1: colleagues or acquaintances. The subjects were to assume they were
Speaker 1: one of the two figures. The scientists found that residents
Speaker 1: of Argentina, Peru, and Bulgaria stand the closest to strangers,
Speaker 1: while those from Romania, Hungary, and Saudi Arabia want the
Speaker 1: most space. Americans were somewhere in the middle. The researchers
Speaker 1: also studied the personal bubbles we draw between ourselves and
Speaker 1: family and friends. We're all fine with our family and
Speaker 1: friends standing closer to us than strangers, no surprise there,
Speaker 1: and our general bubble size with our friends stays consistent.
Speaker 1: That is, if we like more personal space, will keep
Speaker 1: our friends farther away than those who are fine with
Speaker 1: less personal space. But intriguingly, things change when it comes
Speaker 1: to close friends or loved ones. The Romanians, who like
Speaker 1: a lot of personal space between themselves and both strangers
Speaker 1: and colleagues, like their intimate relations to be fairly close
Speaker 1: to them about one point five feet or point four
Speaker 1: five meters. That is closer than almost any other group
Speaker 1: studied in the Norwegians, whose preference for stranger distance is
Speaker 1: somewhere in the middle of the forty two countries studied,
Speaker 1: want their close friends to be closer to them than
Speaker 1: any other group about one point three feet or point
Speaker 1: four meters. Scientists say it appears temperature has something to
Speaker 1: do with personal space. Those living in colder climates often
Speaker 1: prefer to be quite near to their friends, perhaps as
Speaker 1: a way to stay warm, and those residing in warm
Speaker 1: climates often stand closer to strangers. At least one past
Speaker 1: study showed when it's warm, people move in closer to
Speaker 1: one another. Today's episode was written by Melanie rad Zeke
Speaker 1: McManus and produced by Dylan Fagan. For more on this
Speaker 1: and other topics, please visit us at how stuff works
Speaker 1: dot com.