A DEVELOPMENTAL STUDY OF INTERPERSONAL DISTANCE AND BODILY ORIENTATION IN JAPAN

Abstract

The present study was designed to investigate the developmental process of interpersonal distance and bodily orientation in relation to sex of the subjects and interpersonal feelings.Ss were 120 male and 120 female students from 3rd, 5th, and 8th grades of elementary and junior high school within the same public school system and from the undergraduate students of a university. They served as subjects in same sex pair or opposite sex pair. Each pair of the subjects was photographed through one-way mirror every 20 seconds when they were playing the roles of liking pair and disliking pair. In each relationship, ten photographs were obtained. Interpersonal distances and bodily orientations were measured on the basis of analysis of the photographs.The major findings are as follows:(1) The interpersonal distances of the same sex pairs enlarged relatively linear, while those of the opposite sex pairs showed curvilinear pattern having the highest level at puberty.(2) In all the grade levels, male-male dyads were inclined to maintain greater interpersonal distance than female-female dyads.(3) In all the grade levels, disliking pairs maintained greater interpersonal distance than liking pairs.(4) In all the grade levels, liking pairs interacted face-to-face more often than disliking pairs.(5) In comparison with younger graders, adults (undergraduate students) interacted with less faced bodily orientation.In summary, the childrens' spatial behavior in social interactions is similar to adults', and so the mode of spatial bebavior is considered to be learned earlier than the age of the subjects in the present study.