Social distancing between personal belongings during the COVID-19 pandemic

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has led to instructions and suggestions from governments experts maintain social (physical) distance between people prevent aerosol transmission of the virus, which is now becoming norm. Thus, we examined whether extended personal belongings. Methods: We recruited 68 university students instructed them place their belongings on a long table following another participant (i.e., confederate). measured physical two participant’s confederate’s). collected data June 10, 2022 January 23, 2023. Pre-pandemic was Ariga (2016). Analysis completed with one-tailed t-tests. Results: Compared pre-pandemic results, via t-test, during significantly longer. Our results supported hypothesis that psychological framework for processing people’s dramatically changed this pandemic. Conclusion: This change may have been driven by distancing practices or an increase in perceived vulnerability disease. provide new implications future public spatial design, other words, not only people, but also belongings.