An IAT Study Of Interpersonal Psychological Distance

Interpersonal psychological distance is a kind of subjective experience about the distance between self and other person or objects. It can influence individual’s emotion, attitude, thought, and decision.This study use the method of the IAT to investigate psychological distance. Study 1 is an IAT test based on the Construal Level Theory. The Attribute words are from four dimensions that are temporal distance, spatial distance, social distance, and hypotheticality. The Target words are typical close or distant people. The result showed that the implicit effect is significant among all four dimensions, and four dimensions were significant correlation. It had a good internal consistency (a=0.76). The whole study conformed to the hypothesis of CLT.Study 2 was based on the perspective of individual using the Attribute words in study 1. Study 2 investigated the psychological distance to a friend and a leader of the participant using IAT. CID and IOS were also used in the study. The result showed that to a person, higher level of implicit effect was easily associated with further psychological distance. The result of IAT among self-friend, self-leader, and friend-leader revealed that the implicit effect may be addable. To close person, the result of IAT and CID was significant correlation, while to distant person, the result of IAT and CID had no correlation. The result of IAT and IOS had no significant correlation.Study 3 compared the result of SC-IAT and IAT. It showed that to distant person, the correlation approached significance, while to close person, there was no significant correlation. Referencing the model of psychology size and psychological distance, it may revealed that self which is the origin of psychological distance can’t be regarded as particle, and that the structure of psychological distance may influence the study result.