Openness Feeling on Height Direction in High Ceiling Room and Bending Pattern of Leading Passage

Abstract

This paper investigates a psychological experiment was conducted for examine whether the openness feeling on height direction arising when entering a high ceiling room could be control by the bending pattern of leading passage. 32 college students as the participants walked around the virtual environment including the high ceiling rooms with the narrow passages. Seven experimental conditions are created by connecting six different shaped “narrow-passages” to one side of the “high ceiling room” or not connecting any approach. The result is that the ceiling height in the “high-ceiling-room” tends to adjust lower when connecting the “narrow-passage” of the upward slope than when connecting the straight “narrow-passage”. It is suggested that by adding a physical movement “climbing up an oblique road” could suppress openness feeling in the high ceiling room.