This article was downloaded by: [York University Libraries]On: 18 November 2014, At: 19:49Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH,UK

Experimental Aging Research:An International JournalDevoted to the Scientific Studyof the Aging ProcessPublication details, including instructions forauthors and subscription information:http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/uear20

The effects of subjects' ageand expectations regarding aninterviewer on personal spaceJohn A. Feroleto a & Beverley Roberts Gounard aa Department of Psychology , State University ofNew York College at Buffalo , Buffalo, New York,14222Published online: 27 Sep 2007.

To cite this article: John A. Feroleto & Beverley Roberts Gounard (1975) The effectsof subjects' age and expectations regarding an interviewer on personal space,Experimental Aging Research: An International Journal Devoted to the Scientific Studyof the Aging Process, 1:1, 57-61, DOI: 10.1080/03610737508257946

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03610737508257946

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57

THE EFFECTS OF SUBJECTS' AGE AND EXPECTATIONS REGARDING

AN INTERVIEWER ON PERSONAL SPACE

JOHN A. FEROLETO and

BEVERLEY ROBERTS GOUNARD Department of Psychology

Srate University of New York College at Buffalo Bufflo, New York 14222

Feroleto, J.A. & Gounard, B.R. The effects of subjects ' age and expectations re- garding an interviewer on personal space. Experimental Aging Research, 1975, 1 (I). 57-61. How close individuals seat themselves to an interviewer was studied as a function of subjects' age and expectations regarding the interviewer. An ex- perimental approach situation was used and the subjects were 10 college students and 10 residents of a county home. Those subjects who had been told to expect an unpleasant interaction seated themselves significantly farther from the in- terviewer than did those who expected a pleasant interaction. Also, the older sub- jects seated themselves significantly farther from the interviewer than the younger subjects did, ?he difference between the age groups was minimal when the sub- jects' expectations were positive, but was pronounced when the subjects' expecta- tions were negative. The results appear to reflect a greater susceptibility among older individuals to feeling threatened and ill-at-ease in an interpersonal situation.

Personal space is that area surrounding an individual which is re- garded as belonging to the self. I n a n experimental approach situation, the extent of this personal space is defined in terms of how close an in- dividual will approach another in an interpersonal interaction. Previous research has shown that a number of demographic and personality variables are related to the size of one's personal space. Evans (1973) has reviewed this literature. In general, i t appears that whenever a situation is perceived as stressful, the size of an individual's personal space in- creases. Dosey and Meisels (1968) have demonstrated how this stress can arise from threats to an individual's self-esteem as well as from threats re- lating to physical danger.

We conducted a brief experiment to examine the effects of two variables, subjects' age and expectations regarding an interviewer, on personal space as determined by an experimental approach method. One would expect that older adults, especially those resident in an institutional

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58 FEROLETO/GOUNARD

environment as were the subjects in the present study, would encounter many more threats to their self-esteem in their daily lives than would younger college students. Would these older individuals then show a re- sultant increase in the size of their personal space when compared with young college students? Alternatively, would the older people show a smaller personal space since the experimental situation might be perceived as an opportunity for a much-desired friendly interaction, whereas it would have less value socially for the college students?

In order to provide a direct manipulation of the stressfulness of the experimental situation, the subjects were given information that would lead them to expect either a positive or a negative interaction with an in- terviewer. I t was hypothesized that negative expectations would result in greater interpersonal distance than would positive expectations. Furthermore, the interaction between the age and expectation variables was of potential interest in interpreting any possible differences in behavior as a function of age.

METHOD General Design

A 2 x 2 factorial design was used with both the Age factor (older vs. younger) and Expectation factor (negative vs. positive) manipulated between subjects.

Subjects The older subjects were six male and four female residents of the

Erie County Home Annex located on the campus of the State University College at Buffalo. They ranged in age from 49 to 81 years (x = 69.8, SD = 10.55). Subjects were selected on the basis of their willingness to participate in the study, and for their relative freedom from physical im- pairments that would interfere with their performance. In other respects (education, socioeconomic status, etc.), they were considered typical of residents in an urban county-operated home. The younger group of sub- jects consisted of five male and five female undergraduate students who were not acquainted with either the experimenter or the interviewer. They ranged in age from 18 to 26 years (x = 21.8, SD = 2.62). The ex- perimenter approached students in the Student Union Building, and re- quested their participation in the experiment.

E-rperimen tal Room. The experimental room, which was located on the fourth floor of the

Student Union Building, was windowless and measured 5.18m square and

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AGE AND PERSONAL SPACE 59

2.74m high. It contained a conference table which was 2.79m in length, and 1.21m at its widest point tapering to 0.90m at each end. The in- terviewer was seated in a chair which was placed on one side of the con- ference table. A chair for the subject was placed on the same side, and at a distance of 2.44m from the interviewer. The subject’s chair was located near the door, and was placed facing the opposite direction from the in- terviewer’s chair so that the subject was forced to change the chair’s posi- tion.

Procedure. The male experimenter escorted each subject directly to the ex-

perimental room, ostensibly so that the subject could be interviewed re- garding his views concerning restricted subject matter on television. As they were walking to the room, the experimenter randomly presented half of the subjects in each age group with information that would lead them to expect either a positive or a negative interaction with the interviewer (us- ing instructions adapted from Gross, Collins, & Bryan, 1972). For exam- ple, he told half of the subjects in each age group that the interviewer was “abrupt, rude, and rather aggressive” and made people feel “quite un- comfortable.” He reported that other interviewees had told him that their experience was “rather unpleasant,” and that he was “not too happy with this interviewer.” The remaining half of the subjects were told that the in- terviewer was “polite and rather nice” and made people feel “quite com- forable.” He also reported that the other interviewees had told him that their experience was “rather pleasant,” and that he was “rather happy with this interviewer.”

At the door of the experimental room, the experimenter told the subject to go in. As the subject entered the room, the interviewer told the subject to “have a seat.” The subject moved his chair as close to the interviewer as he wished and was seated. The interviewer immediately arose and placed a piece of masking tape next to the right front leg of the subject’s chair. Although the experiment was actually complete at this point, the in- terviewer did proceed to ask each subject four questions concerning his views on the presentation of violence on television before the subject left the room. The interviewer then measured the distance in inches from the tape mark made beside the subject’s chair to a tape mark that had been made beside the right front leg of his own chair. Inches are converted to the metric system for the description of procedure and reporting of data.

Iii tervirwer The interviewer was a 47-year-old male of average build who was

neatly dressed in casual sports clothes. He was an acquaintance of the

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first author and was recruited on a volunteer basis for his relative lack of contact with either college-age students or nursing-home residents. He was a high school graduate who was usually employed as a skilled in- dustrial technician. The interviewer was blind to the experimental manipulation of the subjects’ expectations, and was naive as to the possi- ble results of the experiment. In fact, he was not informed until the termination of the study that the distance information alone and not the information gained during the interview was of experimental interest. He was carefully instructed to say no more to the subjects than “Have a seat” before the interview began and to ask the questions in a prescribed order.

RESULTS A two-way analysis of variance was computed o n the distance

scores. The older individuals seated themselves significantly farther from the interviewer than did the younger subjects ( p c 0.001). Also the sub- jects expecting a negative interaction seated themselves significantly farther away from the interviewer than did the subjects expecting a positive interaction ( p < 0.005). In addition, the. interaction of the Age and Expectation factors was significant ( p < 0.05). Table 1 shows the mean distance assumed by each group of subjects.

Table 1 . .

Mean DistanceaAssumed by Each Age Group as a Function of Negative

and Positive Expectations

Inches Group Negative Positive

Older 58.8 (SD = 10.57) 38.8 (SD = 10.23) You nger 36.0 (SD = I .OO) 30.6 ( S D = 1.52)

Metric Conversion Older 1.49 ( S D = 0.27) 0.99 (SD = 0.26) Younger 0.91 ( S D = 0.03) 0.78 (SD = 0.04)

“Note: Measurements were in inches. but are also converted to centimeters for purposes of presentation and consistency with international publication.

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AGE'AND PERSONAL SPACE 61

The difference between the age groups was minimal when the sub- jects' expectations were positive but was pronounced when the subjects' expectations were negative.

DISCUSSION Overall, the older subjects in this study displayed a larger in-

terpersonal distance in the interview situation than the younger subjects did. The fact that this difference occurred primarily when subjects ex- pected an unpleasant rather than a pleasant interaction suggests that the older individuals were more prone to feeling threatened and ill-at-ease. Other interpretations of the age effect are, of course, possible. Lawton ( 1970). for example, has suggested that an older person's behavior is con- trolled to ;I major degree by the placement of furnishings. This environ- mental docility hypothesis would lead to a prediction that the older sub- jects would seat themselves farther from the interviewer than the younger subjects, but would not be useful in interpreting the interaction of the Age and Expectation factor. In addition. one cannot rule out the possibility that minor infirmities associated with increasing age might have made it more difficult for the older subjects to move their chair as close to the in- terviewer as the younger subjects did. However, again, this interpretation is not adequate for explaining the interaction.

The overall significant difference between subjects with negative and those with positive expectations demonstrates that the instructions were successful in manipulating the perceived stressfulness of the experimen- tal situation. Since the older subjects did not differ markedly from the younger subjects when expectations were positive, i t appears that older individuals can respond favorably when a third party presents them with information designed to reduce the amount of threat that a situation might pose for them. One would certainly hope that an actual interviewer would take measures to reduce an older person's discomfort in a potentially un- pleasant situation.

REFERENCES DOSEY. M.A., & MEISELS, M. Personal space and self-protection. Joitrncrl of Prrsoriulity

EVANS, G.W. Personal space: Research review and bibliography. ,Mtr/~-Environ,,lcrlt

GROSS, A.E., COLLINS, B.E., & BRYAN. J.H. Air iritrodiiction to reseorch ir i socitrl

LAWTON, M.P. Ecology and aging. In L.A. Pastalan & D.H. Carson (Eds.). Spcrticrl hch~rvior

Received April 21, 197s: cicceptedf uly 28, 1975.

cindSociu1 Psychology. 1969. 11. 93-97.

S ~ S ~ ~ W I S . 1973, 3.203-215.

psychology: Exercises cirid e.rcirnples. New York: Wiley. 1972.

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