Sharing Experiences that Involve Proximal versus Distal Senses: Implications for Social Closeness

Shared experiences increase social closeness. Combining insights from perception theories, which distinguish between spatially proximal senses (touch, taste) and distal senses (sight, hearing), with classical literature in social psychology, which suggests that spatial proximity both reflects and creates social proximity, we hypothesized that sharing an experience that involves a more proximal sense would both reflect and create more social proximity. Study 1 confirmed that people associate the different senses with different spatial distance from the sensed object, and assume that partners who sense the same object at the same time must be spatially closer to each other when the sense is more proximal. Study 2 found that participants preferred to share experiences dominated by a distal (proximal) sense with socially distant (close) others. Study 3 found that participants expected shared experiences that involved more proximal senses to lead to more social closeness. In Study 4 participants evaluated products by either touching them or only seeing them alongside another participant whom they did not know, with spatial distance between partners kept constant. We found that participants in the touch condition felt closer to each other than in the sight condition. Our theory and findings bridge between perception theories on how senses map on spatial distance, and social psychological theories on how spatial distance affects and reflects social distance. We discuss implications for how to use shared experiences to enhance social closeness or reduce it. Boundary conditions, limitations, and future directions are also discussed.