Personal space size:
A safety zone to protect
you from aggression?
It’s a widely recognised stereotype that different people and cultures can have varied concepts of ideal interpersonal space. Yet it seems that personal space can vary within individuals as well.
Research by Vagnoni et al (2018) has found that interpersonal space size increases following listening to a conversation with aggressive content. This suggests that interpersonal space might be a way of protecting yourself from an aggressive confrontation.
Original research: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0192753