Propinquity:As physical distance between people decreases and opportunities for
interaction increase, relationships are more likely to form. Physical nearness is called
propinquity.An early study on friendship patterns in a housing complex showed this
factor’s strong effects: residents were much more likely to be friends with the people
next door than with those who lived only two doors away. Furthermore, people
who lived next to a staircase had more friends than those at the ends of a corridor
(presumably, they were more likely to ‘bump into’ people using the stairs).
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Physical
structure has a lot to do with who we get to know and how popular we are.
● Mere exposure:We come to like persons or things simply as a result of seeing them
more often, which is known as the mere exposure phenomenon.
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Greater frequency of
contact, even if unintentional, may help to determine one’s set of local referents. The
same effect holds when evaluating works of art or even political candidates.
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One
study predicted 83 per cent of the winners of political primaries solely by the amount
of media exposure given to candidates