It is easy, because it isn’t a psychological problem (despite the various nasty hypotheses that are commonly put forward by those inconvenienced by the problem). It is, instead, straightforwardly physiological. Seats are almost always built too short for most men (in order to comfortably accommodate shorter people). That causes the knees to fall outwards, unless they are consciously held together at every moment, which leads to muscular cramping in fairly short order. If seats were a couple of inches taller, the feet would just touch the ground, and the knees wouldn’t drop to the sides. (Of course, shorter people would then have the problem of their feet not quite touching the ground.) There is no public service campaign that is going solve this problem. It is exactly tantamount to the problem of most seats being too narrow to accommodate any but the thinest people.
Chris ….. Christopher D Green Department of Psychology York University Toronto, ON M3J 1P3 Canada chri...@yorku.ca http://www.yorku.ca/christo ………………………………... On Dec 21, 2014, at 10:47 AM, Beth Benoit <beth.ben...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > I hesitate to put the title of the whole article in the subject line for fear > of it hitting everyone's spam filter, but this article about "manspreading" > on the subways of NYC on the front page of The New York Times today caught my > attention. ("Manspreading" is the unlovely practice of men sitting with > their legs in a wide V shape, thus taking up two spaces on the subway.) > > The thought occurred to me that putting up posters asking men to be more > considerate of their fellow passengers might not be the most effective way to > get men to stop doing this. > > So, fellow TIPSters, in the name of psychological science, can we think of a > way to help the M.T.A. effectively fight manspreading? > > http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/21/nyregion/a-scourge-is-spreading-mtas-cure-dude-close-your-legs.html?_r=0 > > Beth Benoit > Plymouth State University > Plymouth, New Hampshire > > --- > > You are currently subscribed to tips as: chri...@yorku.ca. > > To unsubscribe click here: > http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=430248.781165b5ef80a3cd2b14721caf62bd92&n=T&l=tips&o=41227 > > (It may be necessary to cut and paste the above URL if the line is broken) > > or send a blank email to > leave-41227-430248.781165b5ef80a3cd2b14721caf62b...@fsulist.frostburg.edu > > > --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@mail-archive.com. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=41229 or send a blank email to leave-41229-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
