The research, plainly
Festinger, Schachter, and Back mapped friendships in MIT student housing and found proximity was destiny: neighbors became friends, people near stairwells knew everyone, and a few extra feet of distance measurably cut connection. Repeated accidental contact is how relationships actually start.
The receipt: Festinger et al., 1950
What it means for events
Stop hoping networking happens and start engineering collision. Who sits near whom, which cohorts share rooms and hotel floors, where the coffee forces lingering — proximity design is relationship design with a floor plan.
Where to run it
Seating strategy
Same tables across multiple sessions. Familiarity needs repetition, and repetition needs assignment.
Venue layout
One shared coffee point beats four convenient ones — inconvenience that causes collision is a feature.
Multi-day events
Cohort hotels and shared shuttles quietly do more networking than the networking reception.
Seen in the wild
Related concepts
Now use it
Score your own event against principles like this one — or make the whole vocabulary official.
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