According to Edward Hall, intimate distance is maintained when you ar…

According to Edward Hall, intimate distance is maintained when you are:

Answer & explanation

Correct answer: option 3

The correct answer is Option (3) → talking privately to someone

Edward Hall, an anthropologist, described four kinds of interpersonal physical distance that people keep, depending on the situation. Each option describes one of them.

Option (1) Interacting one-to-one with a friend — Incorrect. This is personal distance (18 inches to 4 feet), kept when interacting one-to-one with a close friend, a relative, or even someone not very close in a work setting.

Option (2) formally interacting — Incorrect. This is social distance (4 to 10 feet), kept when the interaction is formal and not close.

Option (3) talking privately to someone — Correct. Intimate distance (up to 18 inches) is the distance kept when talking privately to someone, or interacting with a very close friend or relative.

Option (4) interacting with large number of people — Incorrect. This is public distance (10 feet to infinity), kept in a formal setting with a large number of persons, such as an audience and a public speaker.

Note: Edward Hall’s four kinds of interpersonal distance, intimate distance among them, were there in the chapter ‘Psychology and Life’ of the pre-rationalised NCERT, which NTA followed in 2023, and are not there in the NCERT book (2025-26). Hence this question has been picked from the pre-rationalised NCERT.

NCERT (Pre-rationalised): “Crowding … Edward Hall, an anthropologist, mentioned four kinds of interpersonal physical distance, depending on the situation:

Intimate distance (upto 18 inches) : The distance you maintain when you are talking privately to someone, or interacting with a very close friend or relative.
Personal distance (18 inches to 4 feet) : The distance you maintain when you are interacting one-to-one with a close friend, relative, or even with someone not very close to you in a work setting or other social situation.
Social distance (4 to 10 feet) : The distance you maintain when the interaction is formal, and not close.
Public distance (10 feet to infinity) : The distance you maintain in a formal setting, where there is a large number of persons. For example, the distance of an audience from a public speaker, or a teacher in a classroom.…”