Spatial Distance and Mental Construal of Social Events

Abstract

Construal-level theory proposes that increasing the reported spatial distance of events leads individuals to represent the events by their central, abstract, global features (high-level construal) rather than by their peripheral, concrete, local features (low-level construal). Results of two experiments indicated that participants preferred to identify actions as ends rather than as means to a greater extent when these actions occurred at a spatially distant, as opposed to near, location (Study 1), and that they used more abstract language to recall spatially distant events, compared with near events (Study 2). These findings suggest that spatially distant events are associated with high-level construals, and that spatial distance can be conceptualized as a dimension of psychological distance.

Years, Months, and Days versus 1, 12, and 365: The Influence of Units versus Numbers

“…We then asked them to selfreport whether their overall thoughts were of a specific (i.e., concrete) or general (i.e., abstract) nature (1 p very specific; 7 p very general). This self-reported measure revealed that, consistent with prior research (e.g., Fujita et al 2006 ) when the open-ended responses were coded by two judges as concrete or abstract. Respondents in the near condition were more likely to have concrete versus abstract thoughts (65% concrete, 35% abstract) relative to those in the far condition (31% concrete, 69% abstract).…”

Scale and construal: How larger measurement units shrink length estimates and expand mental horizons

“…For example, "making a list" could be described as "writing things down" or "getting organized," respectively. By coding concrete identifications as 0 and abstract identifications as 1, we were able to calculate an abstract identification index for each participant by summing their scores (which ranged from 0 to 15, see Fujita, Henderson et al, 2006). Finally, participants indicated their age and gender to complete the study.…”

“…Additionally, the relationship between distance and construal is posited to be bidirectional. Thus, not only do people describe distal events using more abstract language (Fujita, Henderson, Eng, Trope, & Liberman, 2006), but they also respond to manipulations of high-level construalthinking about abstract elements of an action -by expecting that the action will happen further in the future than when thinking about it concretely (Liberman, Trope, McCrea, & Sherman, 2007).…”

Is the Privacy Paradox a Matter of Psychological Distance? An Exploratory Study of the Privacy Paradox from a Construal Level Theory Perspective

“…Spatial distance indicates that individuals construe faraway things or events more abstractly and nearby things more concretely [30]. Studies on temporal distance have found that individuals represent events happening in the past or future abstractly compared to events happening in the immediate environment [32].…”