Spatial Intimacy: Personal Space

Edward T. Hall described the interpersonal distances of man (the relative distances between people) in four distinct zones:

Proxemics is the study of human use of space and the effects that population density has on behaviour, communication and social interaction.

Personal distance is used for conversations with friends, to chat with associates, and in group discussions.

• Close phase – 1.5 to 2.5 feet (46 to 76 cm)

• Far phase – 2.5 to 4 feet (76 to 122 cm)

Example Kohnstammhof at HvA

"A person's personal space is carried with them everywhere they go. It is the most inviolate form of territory. Body spacing and posture are unintentional reactions to sensory fluctuations or shifts, such as subtle changes in the sound and pitch of a person's voice."

Personal space is the region surrounding a person which they regard as psychologically theirs. Most people value their personal space and feel discomfort, anger, or anxiety when their personal space is encroached. Permitting a person to enter personal space and entering somebody else's personal space are indicators of perception of those people's relationship. In an impersonal, crowded situation, eye contact tends to be avoided. In Virtual Reality

personal space

Example Research: Psychophysiological Responses to Virtual Crowds and its Effects on Cognition

Human responses to crowds were investigated with a simulation of a busy street scene using virtual reality. Both psychophysiological measures and a memory test were used to assess the influence of large crowds or individual agents who stood close to the participant while they performed a memory task. paper

Virtual Agents and Personal Space

Virtual Crowds and their effects on Human Psychophysiology

Example Artwork Anthony Gormley

Antony Gormley in his last exhibition Model at The White Cube, created a series of works that articulate the relationship between these two different types of geometry and questions the way we inhabit our personal space. In this project that “investigates our experience of architecture through the body and of the body through architecture”, putting in relation the idea of pixel used in computer technology and the physical body.

Personal Space in Neuropsychology

The field of neuropsychology describes personal space in terms of the kinds of "nearness" to an individual body.

• Extrapersonal space: The space that occurs outside the reach of an individual.

• Peripersonal space: The space within reach of any limb of an individual. Thus, to be "within arm's length" is to be within one's peripersonal space.
• Pericutaneous space: The space just outside our bodies but which might be near to touching it. Visual-tactile perceptive fields overlap in processing this space. For example, an individual might see a feather as not touching their skin but still experience the sensation of being tickled when it hovers just above their hand. Other examples include the blowing of wind, gusts of air, and the passage of heat.