A DAY IN THE BUS: SEAT SELECTION PSYCHOLOGY
Saturday,
The other day I was travelling in the bus from home to office. As usual I was the first guy to board the bus and that day was special to me in some way. So I chose to sit in the Last seat available in the bus to get a good view of the passengers boarding. I noticed something very interesting. People boarding the bus do not always choose “any” seat in the bus, they choose “the” seat in the bus which satisfies them based on some parameters. So how does the selection occur. what makes a person not to choose the first seat available in the bus and what makes them decide that the seat they have chosen is best for them.
Take a simple bus which has some seats (say 30 seats) and the window in every seat is either open or closed. I am going to brainstorm . so here goes
The place in the seat. 1) . should be comfortable. 2) . should be near to the window. 3) . should not be near to the door to avoid taking a hit from people rushing in 4) . can be the first seat near to the driver so that one can get a good view of the road. 5) . can be the last seat so that one can have privacy while, say reading a book and to avoid curious people taking a peek from your back. 6) . should not be over the tyre of the bus to avoid a bumpy ride 7) . should not be near a fat person who takes 3/4 th of the space leaving you enough space to keep your toe. 8) . should not be near a place which is surrounded with people who talk loudly and keep interfering with what you are doing. 9) . should not be near a pole so that if you are in a jam packed bus you do not get pain because a person was leaning on youu all the time and when confronted, shouts at you and says “Hey this is not a god damn airplane but a stinky bus”. 10) . should not be near a person who keeps coughing right in your face and if adviced would reply back that his disease would come back to him if he closes his mouth 11) . should be usually in the left side for right handed people and vice versa so that the active hand is not hindered by keeping it on the window and if you give change to the conductor the window sill might hit your working hand and cause injury. 12) . more to come. it must be your contribution
Let us think abou this scenario for sometime
1) . your gender (male or female). females usually don’t like to be seated near males who keep staring at them. 2) . your region of socialism, that is you can be a person who is comfortable in a crowded place, or you may need some extra space. People in thickly populate countries are comfortable with crowd and in scarcely populated place cannot handle the crowd. 3) . your body sizepact or extra large. you might not fit into the whole seat. 4) . the weather. summer, winter, rainy etc. for example in the rainy season you may not prefer the seat near the window and cleverly offer the seat to a person so that he/she may think you are doing it because you are compassionate 😉 5) . the character. you do not care which seat. you care for the best seat. 6) . the proximity of your place. suppose you are travelling long distance you may select the last seat so nobody disturbs you while you are sleeping. 7) . your familiarity of the place. if you are a new guy to the city, it is best to select the place near the FetLife window so that you get to know the place better and remember landmarks and also to avoid getting down at the wrong stop. 8) . availablity of seats. if there is only one last seat left you should be selecting that or else. 9) . the list never ends.