WHERE DO WE STAND?

WHERE DO WE STAND? Lisa Davis In the following article. Lisa Davis. A freelance writer in the United States focuses on cultural differences in using personal space - one type of nonverbal communication and on problems arising from these differences.

 "Where Do We Stand?" was originally published in the magazine In Health in 1990. Call it the dance of the jet set, the diplomat's tango: A man from the Middle East, say, falls into conversation with an American, becomes animated, and takes a step forward. The American makes a slight postural adjustment, shifts his feet, and edges backward. A little more talk and the Arab advances; a little more talk and the American retreats. "By the end of the cocktail party," says Middle East expert Peter Bechtold, of the State Department's Foreign Service Institute, "you have an American in each corner of the room because that's as far as they can back up.

" What do you do when an amiable chat leaves one person feeling vaguely bullied, the other unaccountably chilled Things would be simpler if these jet-setters were speaking different languages they'd just get themselves a translator. But the problem's a little tougher because they're using different languages of space. Everyone who's ever felt cramped in a crowd knows that the skin is not the body's only boundary. We each wear a zone of privacy like a hoop skirt, inviting others in or keeping them out with body language - by how closely we approach, the angle at which we face them, the speed with which we break a gaze- It's a subtle code, but one we use and interpret easily, indeed automatically, having absorbed the vocabulary from infancy. 

At least, we assume we're reading it right. But from culture to culture, from group to group within a single country, even between the sexes, the language of space has distinctive accents, confusing umlauts. That leaves a lot of room for misinterpretation, and the stakes have gotten higher as business has become increasingly international and populations multicultural. So a new breed of consultants has appeared in the last few years, interpreting the meaning and use of personal space for globe-trotters of all nationalities. For instance, says international business consultant Sondra Snowdon, Saudi Arabians like to conduct business discussions from within spitting distance literally. "I hey bathe in each other's breath as part of building the relationship.

"Americans back up," says Snowdon, "but they're harming their chances of winning the contracts." In seminars, Snowdon discusses the close quarters common in Middle Eastern conversations and has her students practice talking with each other at very chummy distances, Still, her clients had better be careful where they take their shrunken "space bubble," because cultures are idiosyncratic in their spatial needs. Japanese subways bring people about as close together as humanly possible, for instance, yet even a handshake can be offensively physical in a Japanese office.

 And, says researcher and writer Mildred Reed Hall, Americans can even make their business counterparts in Japan uncomfortable with the kind of direct eye contact that's normal here. "Not only do most Japanese businessmen not look at you, they keep their eyes down," Hall says. "We look at people for hours, and they feel like they're under a searchlight. The study of personal space got underway in the early 1950s when anthropologist Edward Hall described a sort of cultural continuum of personal space.

 (Hall has frequently collaborated with his wife, Mildred.) According to Hall, on the "high-contact" side of the continuum in Mediterranean and South American societies, for instance, social conversations include much eye contact, touching, and smiling, typically while standing at a distance of about a foot. On the other end of the scale, say in Northern European cultures, a lingering gaze may feel invasive, manipulative, or disrespectful; a social chat takes place at a remove of about two and a half feet.

 In the middle-of-the-road United States, people usually stand about 18 inches apart for this sort of conversation unless we want to win foreign friends and influence people, in which case, research shows, we'd better adjust our posture. In one study, when British graduate students were trained to adopt Arab patterns of behavior (facing their partners straight on, with lots of eye contact and smiling), Middle Eastern exchange students found them more likable and trustworthy than typical British students.

 In contrast, the misuse of space can call whole personalities into suspicion: When researchers seated pairs of women for conversation, those forced to talk at an uncomfortably large distance were more likely to describe their partners as cold and rejecting. Don't snuggle up too fast, though. Men in that study were more irritated by their partners when they were forced to talk at close range. Spatially speaking, it seems men and women are subtly foreign to each other. No matter whether a society operates at arm's length or cheek-to-jowl, the women look at each other more and stand a bit closer than the men.

 It just goes to show that you can't take things for granted even within the borders of a single country. Take that unwilling amalgamation of ethnic minorities, the Soviet Union. According to psychologist Robert Sommer, who along with Hall sparked the study of personal space, spatial needs collide in the republics. "The Estonians are a non-contact people," says Sommer, of the University of California at Davis. "I went to a 'Hands Around the Baltic event, and nobody touched hands. The Russians, on the other hand, are high-contact. 

The Estonians say the Russians are pushy, and the Russians say the Estonians are cold." Nor are things easier within the United States. Researchers have found, for instance, that middle-class, Caucasian school teachers often jump to mistaken conclusions when dealing with a child from a different background: If a girl from an Asian family averts her eyes out of respect for her teacher's authority, the teacher may well go on alert, convinced that the child is trying to hide some misbehavior. 

Ethnically diverse workplaces can be similarly booby-trapped. Such glitches are all the more likely because spatial behavior is automatic it snaps into focus only when someone doesn't play by the rules. Say an American businessman is alone in a roomy elevator when another man enters. The newcomer fails to perform the national ritual of taking a comer and staring into Space; instead, he stands a few inches away, smiling, which is simple politeness in some cultures. "You start to search for a reasonable explanation," says psychologist Eric Knowles, at the University of Arkansas. 

"In many cases, you come up with one without even being aware of it. You say, 'Is this guy a pickpocket? Is he psychotic If no explanation seems to fit, you just think? "This guy's weird, I better get out of here." In fact, such caution is not always unwarranted, because an abnormal use of space can indicate that something odd is going on. Research has shown that when people with schizophrenia approach another person, they often either get closer than normal or stay unusually distant. And a small study of prisoners seemed to show that those with a history of violence needed up to three times the space taken by nonviolent inmates. 

These are reminders that the human need for space is based on an animal reality: The closer you allow a stranger, the more vulnerable you become. However the spatial differences among cultures point to something beyond self-protection. Anthropologist Edward Hall suggests that a culture's use of space is also evidence of reliance on one sense over another: Middle Easterners get much of their information through their senses of smell and touch, he says, which require a close approach; Americans rely primarily on visual information, backing up in order to see an intelligible picture. 

 Conversational distances also tend to reflect the standard greeting distance in each culture, says State Department expert Bechtold. Americans shake hands and then talk at arm's length. Arabs do a Hollywood-style, cheek-to-cheek social kiss, and their conversation is similarly up close and personal. And, at a distance great enough to keep heads from knocking together about two feet the Japanese bow and talk to each other. On the other hand, the need for more or less space may reflect a cultural temperament. "There's no word for privacy in Arab cultures," says Bechtold. "They think it means loneliness.

" Whatever their origin, spatial styles are very real. In fact, even those who set out to transgress find it uncomfortable to intrude on the space of strangers, says psychologist John R. Aiello, at Rutgers University. "I've had students say, 'Boy, that was the hardest thing I ever had to do to stand six inches away when I was asking those questions." Luckily, given coaching and time, it seems to get easier to acculturate to foreign habits of contact. Says Bechtold, "You often see men holding hands in the Middle East and walking down the street together.

 It's just that they're concerned and don't want you to cross the street unescorted, but I've had American pilots come in here and say, "I don't want some s.o.b. holding my hand. Then I see them there, holding the hand of a Saudi. "Personal space isn't so hard for people to learn," Bechtold adds. "What is really much harder is the business of dinner being served at midnight."