Social Distance

What is Social Distance?

Social distance is thought of as a measurable feeling of intimacy between individuals and other socially defined groups. The term is most often used when describing interracial or interethnic relations, but it has also been applied to other social groups characterized by occupation, education, socioeconomic status, and the like.

As originally conceptualized by Georg Simmel in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, social distance incorporated both spatial (or physical) distance and metaphorical (or symbolic) distance. Spatial distance can be reflected in physical segregation (residential, occupational, etc.), whereas symbolic distance can be thought of as the degree to which two individuals have things “in common” or share cultural and social similarities.

Robert Parks, a student of Simmel, utilized the concept of social distance in analyzing racial and ethnic “consciousness”—the degree to which members of different racial and ethnic groups felt closeness or distance from one another. Parks was interested in race relations and predicted that members of different racial and ethnic groups would increasingly feel less social distance from one another over time.

How is Social Distance Measured?

To measure whether social distance increases or decreases with time, Emory Bogardus, working under the influence of Parks, developed the Bogardus Social Distance Scale (see Table 1). Starting in the 1920s, Bogardus administered the survey to students in U.S. colleges and universities approximately every 10 years (except in the 1930s when he was out of the country) between 1926 and 1966. In 1977, subsequent to Bogardus's death, the survey was administered again by Carolyn Owen, Howard Eisner, and Thomas McFaul. The survey asked respondents to rate a number of racial and ethnic groups on a scale from 1 to 7, with 1 representing the closest social distance, and 7 representing the widest (see Table 1). The possible responses were revised slightly between the first and subsequent surveys (see Table 1). The respondent's leftmost answer (on the survey) in each racial/ethnic category was taken to reflect that individual's sense of social distance from members of that category. The survey results were then compared over time to measure the relative increase or decrease in social distance.

Findings

As was predicted by Bogardus, and later by Owen, Eisner, and McFaul, social distance did decrease (however slightly, in many cases) among social groups over time, but individual respondents tended to feel closest to members of groups with more similarities to their own. In all studies, non-ethnic U.S. Whites scored closest to 1 (least social distance), followed by northern and western European Whites, while racial minorities tended to score closer to the bottom. Historic events had an effect on outcomes (World War II, the Korean War, the cold war), as did the respondents' race and/or ethnicity, gender, and place of birth (U.S./ foreign and region within the United States). Two measurements were analyzed in each survey: the overall mean of the sum of all responses and the social distance spread (difference in mean score between the highest- and lowest-scoring groups). Between 1926 and 1977, the overall mean decreased from 2.14 in 1926 to 1.93 in 1977, while the spread decreased from 2.85 in 1926 to 1.37 in 1977, thereby indicating an increase in social acceptance among groups.

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