Why We Stand Where We Do In An Elevator
Step On In Steve Snodgrass via FlickrElevator riders tend to arrange themselves into mini social hierarchies. Rebekah Rousi, a Ph.D. student in cognitive science, conducted an ethnographic study of elevator behavior in two of the tallest office buildings in Adelaide, Australia. After taking a total of 30 elevator rides in the two buildings, she discovered there was an established order to where people tended stand. "More senior men in particular seemed to direct themselves towards the back of the elevator cabins," she writes in a blog for Ethnography Matters. "In front of them were younger men, and in front of them were women of all ages." There was also a difference in where people directed their gaze mid-ride: "Men watched the monitors, looked in the side mirrors (in one building) to see themselves, and in the door mirrors (of the other building) to also watch others. Women would watch...