A Magnitude Effect in Judgments of Subjective Closeness

Events can be far away from or near an observer in several respects: they can be distant or close in a spatial,temporal,social,or hypothetical sense. they can also vary in magnitude,physically,or in terms of impact and importance. we examine the existence of a general effect of perceived magnitude on judgments of subjective closeness. studies 1 to 4 show that proximity judgments,of any type,are affected by the severity of an event so that a highly severe event will be described as closer than a less severe one. study 5 demonstrates the magnitude effect for positive events. finally,study 6 shows that the effect can be extended to distances between comparable events,in addition to the distance from an observer to an event. we see the magnitude effect as a spillover from the scales used to describe events to the scales used to describe distances. © 2015,2015 by the society for personality and social psychology,inc.