Bilfinger Berger Magazine 2/2009

Kaleidoscope

More Kaleidoscope

Until death do us unite
Virtual closeness – Hugs
Tight transportation in Tokyo
Statistics

Big words

“Friendship involves the art of distance, just as love involves the art of closeness.”
(Sigmund Graff, German writer)

“If you wish to have joy from the whole, you must become acquainted with the whole in its smallest parts.”
(From Goethe’s “Faust”)

“I’ve had a lot to do with adults and have often had the chance to observe them up close. Which hasn’t done much for my opinion of them.”
(From Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s “Le Petit Prince”)

DON’T GET TOO CLOSE

Don't get too close (Photo: Silke Körber/photocase)

People need closeness—and distance. Individuals normally only allow those who they know to approach their intimate zone, which, in Western societies, has a radius of around 50 centimeters, according to psychologists. Should an unfamiliar person invade this zone—for example, in an overcrowded train or in an elevator—we tend to avoid eye contact and send nonverbal signals that roughly translate to: “Hey, move away from me!” Conversations typically take place in the personal zone, which is defined by a distance of around 0.5 to 1.5 meters. In this “handshake range” we don’t feel threatened. The social zone is where a lot of job-related contacting takes place: This zone represents the distance between the workplace and the visitor’s chair, as well as the distance to the boss at meetings around the conference table: 1.5 to 3.5 meters.

(Photo: Silke Körber/photocase)
Bilfinger Berger Magazine 2/2009